Bad Moon Rising
by HeyAssButtImBatman
Summary: There were three things of which Gabriel was sure. One: Sam Winchester was a fucking werewolf. Two: He, himself, was also a fucking werewolf. Three: There was some serious bullshit brewing.
1. Chapter 1

Gabriel Shurley was small for a sixteen-year-old junior. Standing at a mere five feet seven inches, he had to look up just to meet most of his friends' eyes. It didn't really bother him. He didn't particularly like being small, but it had its perks. Case in point, right now.

The bell had already rung and school was over. It was Friday, and everyone was rushing to the front of the school, hoping to get out and get the weekend started as soon as possible. Gabriel actually had to go to the back of the school to talk to a teacher about a test he needed to make up. If it weren't for his smallness that allowed him to weave his way between the other people, he would have been trampled.

He heaved a great sigh when he finally popped out into an empty hallway. The great mass of students continued to file slowly out of the front doors, and Gabriel cast one last amused glance over his shoulder at them as he started towards Mr. Burns' classroom.

He was turning a corner when it happened. Something that, to him, seemed ginormous slammed into him with all the force of the bus that hit Regina George and, much like the blonde had, he went flying. He reflexively shot an arm out and grabbed onto the first thing he came into contact with, which just so happened to be the thing that had caused his fall in the first place.

They both crashed painfully to the floor in a tangle of limbs, and Gabriel found himself pinned beneath what felt like hundreds of pounds of person.

"Oh, shit, sorry," whoever it was said. They pulled themselves off of Gabriel, who rolled onto his side and coughed. "I am so, so sorry. I didn't even see you there."

A large hand latched onto his arm and then Gabriel was being pulled to his feet. He looked up and locked eyes with the person who'd smacked into him, and he'd swear on God, the Pope, and all forms of sugar that time froze.

Or at least, both of them did. For a moment, neither of them moved, and Gabriel got a good look at the person who'd bowled him over. The guy was gorgeous. Hazel eyes regarded him above a straight nose and thin lips, and his hair was brown and shaggy. His shoulders were broad, and he towered over Gabriel. Which, honestly, was not that hard to do, but he was sure that this dude would tower over anyone.

"Are you okay?" he asked, and Gabriel realized that he'd been staring.

"I'm fine," he said, proud when his voice sounded normal even though his chest was still tight from having the wind knocked out of him. "Even though you are a giant, I shall survive."

The boy chuckled, and looked down at him with a smile. And really, it was ridiculous how tall he was. He was at least an entire head taller than Gabriel.

"You sure?" the boy asked. "Because I can walk you to the nurse if you need me to."

Was he flirting? Because Gabriel knew flirting, and that glint in his eye was one that he'd seen many times in the mirror. It was hard to tell, but Gabriel decided to play along, just in case he was.

"I don't think I need to go to the nurse," Gabriel said, "but it would be such a tragedy if I passed out on the way to Mr. Burns' room."

"A true tribulation," the boy agreed. "I should go with you, just to make sure nothing happens." Okay. So he was flirting. Good to know. The boy gestured for Gabriel to lead the way and then fell into step with him. "I'm Sam Winchester."

"Gabriel Shurley," Gabriel told him. "So, are you new here, or what? 'Cause I know almost everyone at this school and I don't think I've ever seen you before."

"Yeah, my family just moved here," Sam said. "My parents wanted my brother and I to wait until Monday to come to school, but we were tired of unpacking boxes."

"What a way to spend a Friday." They reached the door to the classroom, and paused awkwardly for a moment. "So, I'll see you around?"

"Definitely," Sam promised. He gave Gabriel one last smile and then turned and walked back down the hallway. Gabriel watched him go until he turned the corner, and then he took a deep breath.

"Okay, so he's hot," Gabriel said to himself. "You can deal with hot people. You do it all the time. This is no different. Now is not the time to develop a crush, Gabriel."

With that in mind, he opened the door and stepped into the classroom.

…

When he got home, it was to find a note taped to the front door.

 _Gabriel,_ it read. _Got called away for a business trip. Back in two weeks, max. Sorry, kid. Love, Dad._

Oh, wonderful. On the day he had forgotten his key, too. Gabriel sighed heavily through his nose and shifted his backpack from one shoulder to the other. This wasn't the first time his father had left without so much as an hour's notice, and it sure as hell wouldn't be the last, Gabriel was sure.

It was annoying, frankly. At the best of times he loved the fact that he didn't have a parent constantly breathing down his neck, but at the worst of times he would wonder if his father really loved him. It was immature, he knew, but still. He couldn't help what he felt, especially when Chuck was gone for an average of half the year, usually without even telling Gabriel where he was going or when he'd be back. Gabriel sometimes wondered if Chuck would one day just forget to come home.

And even when he was home he was kind of distant. Oh, sure, he ate dinner with Gabriel every night, watched movies with him, asked him how his day was, but most of the time he was locked up in his study or at work.

He walked through the gate that led to his backyard and headed immediately for the large tree that grew smack in the center of the yard. It was really the only thing furnishing the lawn. There wasn't even a patio, not that he or his father cared about such things. Besides, the tree was really all Gabriel needed.

He walked around the base until he found the niche in the trunk that he'd carved out a few years ago. Sticking his foot into it, he used a low-hanging branch to pull himself up. The tree was a little difficult to climb, sure, but it was his only way into the house. There was a branch that stopped just in front of his window, which he usually left unlocked for just such an occasion.

He'd been doing this for years, so it was almost second nature to reach out with one hand and open the window, then leap from the branch to the floor of his room. The landing winded him every time, and the pillow he placed on the ground did nothing to soften the blow.

For a moment he laid on the floor and wondered if he had any cracked ribs. Bruises, at the very least, seemed likely, what with getting elbowed more times than he could count while fighting through a crowd of tired high schoolers, getting run over by the human tree that was Sam, and now this.

"It's times like this when I hate being small," he sighed. It was hard pulling himself off the floor, because even though his backpack was digging painfully into his back, he was exhausted and it had been heaven to lie down for even a moment.

He had homework, but also an entire weekend to complete said homework, so he didn't worry too much. Food was a priority, though, seeing as public school food was honestly disgusting and he hadn't eaten lunch. Letting his backpack fall to the floor next to his bed, he started down the stairs towards the kitchen.

Of course, because nothing in his life could ever be easy, Chuck had forgotten to go grocery shopping before he left, and so the only things in the fridge were a half eaten jar of pickles and a bottle of ketchup. Great.

Luckily, Gabriel was prepared. He'd saved up a few hundred bucks from his allowance and change that Chuck never asked for from when he sent Gabriel to the store. It was separate from his actual savings, and only to be used in emergencies. This definitely counted.

He didn't really feel like driving out to the store to get groceries, though, so he just dashed upstairs, grabbed a twenty from the emergency savings, set it on the counter, and ordered a pizza.

He had about twenty minutes until it would arrive, so he figured that he had enough time to take a quick shower. He didn't even stop by his room first, just stripped as he walked to his bathroom, leaving a trail of clothes behind him as he went.

Not bothering to close the door, he pulled the shower curtain closed behind him and stepped into the water. The warm spray felt heavenly on his shoulders and back, both sore from having to carry the weight of his backpack around all day.

He took his time in washing himself, and then shampooing and conditioning his hair, and then just stood under the warm water and let it run over him. It was amazing, and he was reluctant to turn the water off. Only the doorbell ringing made him turn the handle to the off position, and even then he postponed his leaving the bubble of steam for another five minutes.

He'd have to tip the poor delivery person extra to make up for the wait, he decided. Drying himself off quickly, he wrapped the towel loosely around his waist and headed to his room to get some clothes.

There was already someone sitting on his bed when he got there, eating the pizza that Gabriel had ordered. Castiel raised an eyebrow at Gabriel's semi-nudity.

"You were taking too long to answer the door," he said in response to Gabriel's questioning look. "So I got the pizza for you. And this is disgusting, by the way, I don't know how you can stand to eat it."

"Maybe the same way you're eating it right now," Gabriel retorted, nodding to the half-eaten slice in Cas' hand. He walked to his closet and pulled on a pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt, then joined his best friend on his bed. It didn't surprise him that Castiel had broken into his house. He'd been using the tree to visit Gabriel for years. He never used the front door like normal people did.

Then again, Gabriel wasn't the best example of what a normal person was, because he got into Castiel's house by climbing from a concrete fence post to the roof, and then through a skylight that was always kept open unless it rained or something.

"Still," Cas said. "Barbecue chicken and green onions. It's wrong on so many levels."

"Hey, I don't make fun of you when you order pineapple and ham pizza."

Castiel gave him a withering look. "Gabriel, that's called a Hawaiian pizza. It's incredibly popular in America."

"Okay, well, BBQ chicken and green onion pizza is incredibly popular in Gabriel Town, population: One." Gabriel grabbed a slice and took a bite. "Hey, did you know that we have a new student?"

"Yes, he's in my junior/senior engineering class," Castiel said.

"Can you believe how tall he is?" Gabriel asked.

"Gabriel, he's not that much taller than me. You're just short. But he is very hot, though," Castiel said, and Gabriel had to bite back a scowl. How dare Castiel call Sam hot? Actually, he was pretty hot, but Castiel wasn't allowed to comment on that!

And woah, Gabriel, settle down. Where had that jealousy come from? Sam was in no way his, but the thought of Castiel, or anyone else, thinking of him like that made his blood boil. Strange

"Yeah, he is," Gabriel said instead of the insults that wanted to come out. "He knocked me over after school today. I don't know what that boy eats, but I swear it felt like getting hit by a bus."

Castiel frowned. "When after school?" he asked. "Because I saw him get into a car almost as soon as the bell rang."

"Wait, what? He walked me to Mr. Burns' room after school ended."

"Who are you talking about?"

"Who are _you_ talking about?"

"Dean Winchester," Castiel said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"Oh." Well, that made more sense. "I was talking about Sam Winchester, his brother, I think."

"Ah." They both reached for another slice of pizza at the same time. "So," Castiel continued, grinning slyly. "You think Sam Winchester is hot?"

"I could ask you the same thing about Dean," Gabriel replied defensively. Then he smirked. "In fact, I think I will. So, you say he's hot? Does our emotionally constipated little nerd have a crush?"

"I am not a nerd," Castiel said, avoiding the question. "Or if I am, then you're an even bigger one."

Gabriel held up one finger and tilted his head. "I am a dork and little bit of a geek, but definitely not a nerd. That schtick is all yours, bro. But enough of this talk of new hotties and nerdery." Even though he wanted to talk about Sam some more. Was that weird? He felt it was a little weird. "My dad's out of town and won't be back for at least a week."

Castiel didn't even need to look at him to know what he was implying. "I'll go home and pack some clothes later. My toothbrush is still here, right? Do you have food?"

Gabriel snorted. "Yes to the toothbrush, no to the food. He forgot. Again."

"We'll go grocery shopping, too, since I know you can't be trusted to not buy only junk."

It was times like these when Gabriel really loved Castiel.

…

By the time nine o'clock came around, Castiel had driven back to his place and packed up an overnight bag with clothes. The only other things he brought were his phone and his keys; everything else that he'd need - like a toothbrush, phone charger, etc. - Gabriel already had from previous sleepovers.

They'd eaten that pizza late, a little too early for dinner, but definitely too late for lunch. Neither of them wanted to eat anything too heavy before bed, so they simply made a huge batch of popcorn and settled into the couch with thick blankets to watch a movie.

Halfway through The Avengers, Gabriel spoke up for the first time in an hour and a half.

"Do you have any classes with Sam?" he asked casually, eyes focused on the TV but not really taking anything in.

"Sam who?" Castiel asked distractedly. He was completely engrossed in watching as Loki stabbed Coulson in the back; while Gabriel had seen the movie enough times to memorize the entire script, this was Castiel's first time watching it.

"Sam Winchester," Gabriel said. "What other Sams do you know?"

Castiel shot him a suspicious look out of the corner of his eye. "Why would you care if I had any classes with Sam?"

"Just curious," Gabriel said, shrugging. "He's not in any of my classes."

"He's not in any of mine, either," Cas said. "And I only have one with Dean."

"Why would I care about the older one?"

"Well, I assumed that you were interested in the new kids," he said, putting extra emphasis on the 's' in kids, "but now I can see that it is only one of them. So, Gabriel, I must ask. Do you like him?"

Gabriel paused and thought about it before answering. "Maybe. I mean, I only talked to him for five minutes, max," he said. "But from what I could tell, he has a good sense of humour, is pretty smart - he used the word tribulation in a normal conversation, Cas. Who does that?"

"Apparently Sam does," Castiel said. "Okay, so you like him. Maybe. Are you going to ask him out?"

"God, no," Gabriel said, wrinkling his nose. "I just met the dude. I don't want to look like a horndog."

"So, what then? Are you just going to let this fade?"

Gabriel grabbed the remote and paused the movie so that he could turn and face Castiel.

"I don't know," he said. "I kind of don't want this to just fade away."

Castiel raised his eyebrows in surprise. Gabriel could relate. He'd had more crushes than he could count since starting high school. Usually it was just appreciation of good looks or a good sense of humour or the like that faded away after a matter of weeks. The only one he'd ever acted upon was Kali, whom he had dated for almost the entirety of sophomore year. They'd split up when Gabriel realized that he didn't really feel anything for her, and that he had just gotten caught up in her looks the dating craze that had swept the school.

Since then, he'd ben wary of jumping into relationships, so for him to actually consider something with Sam was a big deal, and Castiel knew it.

"Why not?" Cas asked, though not unkindly. "What's so special about him?"

Gabriel had no idea. How could he explain to Castiel something he didn't even know himself? How could he put into the words the strange feeling of complete rightness that he'd felt when he'd first locked eyes with Sam, or the urge that he still felt to get to know the stupid giant?

If they were in a Disney movie or a book, he'd say it was love at first sight, or some bullshit like that, but this was real life. Love at first sight was definitely too strong a descriptor - even plain love was too strong. He didn't even know Sam, so how could he be in love? - but there was definitely something akin to like at first sight.

That wasn't unusual for Gabriel. It was actually how he'd met most of his friends, including Castiel. Back in fifth grade, when he'd first laid eyes on that shy, quiet introvert, he'd felt a deep need to be friends with him. He'd offered to share his Oreos with the boy, and the rest was history.

That's probably what this was, too, though he'd never felt the urge this strongly before.

"Gabriel?" He startled and realized that he'd been lost in thought too long, and Castiel was staring at him. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine, Cas," Gabriel said. "Just… weirded out. I don't know, man, this is strange, even for me."

"It's just a crush," Castiel said reassuringly. But Gabriel was sure that this was more than a crush somehow.

"Yeah," he said softly instead of his true thoughts, and dropped it.

…

The next morning, he woke up long after the sun rose, as usual. On the floor, Castiel's sleeping bag was empty, and the smell of food wafted up from the kitchen. This prompted Gabriel to get up more than anything else did, and he quickly brushed his teeth and walked downstairs.

His best friend was leaning against the counter with a bag of McDonald's next to him, and he rolled his eyes when he saw Gabriel.

"How did I know that you'd wake up for food?" he asked sarcastically.

"Because you're my best friend and you know that the only thing I value more than sleep is food," Gabriel answered promptly. Rifling through the bag, he made an appreciative sound when he saw the platter of hotcakes at the bottom. "So, what's on the agenda for today?"

"Food, first of all," Castiel said, taking a sip of his orange juice. "And then I was thinking we could go see a movie."

"Ooh!" Gabriel raised his arm like he was in school and looked expectantly at Cas, who rolled his eyes.

"What, dork?" he asked.

"I wanna see Kung Fu Panda 3!"

"Actually, I was thinking something more along the lines of Deadpool," Castiel said.

Gabriel tilted his head. "That works, too. But food first, right?"

"Yes, you child, food first," Castiel said fondly.

After they finished breakfast and Gabriel ran back upstairs to change out of his pajamas, they both hopped into Cas' car and headed down to the nearest grocery store. They walked down the aisles with their cart, throwing in anything that they thought they'd need. Well, Castiel did, at least. Gabriel threw in everything he saw that he wanted, which mostly happened in the snacks aisle.

Two hours later, they'd finished putting the groceries away and were looking up movie times in Gabriel's laptop. The closest theatre just so happened to be playing the movie in less than an hour, so they grabbed keys and wallets and headed out.

They hadn't even been on the road for five minutes before Castiel brought up their conversation from the previous night.

"You should ask Sam out."

Oh, lord.

"Why?" Gabriel asked.

Castiel came to a stop at a red light and turned to face him, face practically screaming _Really?_

"Because you like him," Castiel said. "Does he like you?"

"I don't know, Cas, we only talked for five minutes!" Gabriel exclaimed. Then he leaned back in his seat. "But maybe. At least, I think he was flirting with me."

"Okay, so ask him out."

"That was incredible," Gabriel said sarcastically. "Some of the most amazing relationship advice I've ever gotten. You should have a show."

"I was just trying to help," Cas grumbled. "I can tell that Sam's really gotten to you."

"So have a lot of other things," Gabriel pointed out. "And usually if I ignore them, they go away."

"Do you want Sam to go away?"

"...No."

"Then this is different than all those other things." The light turned green again and Castiel was forced to look back at the road. "I just don't want you to regret not doing something about this."

Gabriel let out a sigh and his irritation melted away.

"I know, Castiel," he said softly. "Thanks. But seriously, I can't just ask him out. This isn't a movie or a book where you can just ask anyone out and they'll accept just because you had a _moment_ or whatever with them."

"Then become his friend first."

Gabriel thought back to when he'd asked Sam if they'd see each other around. "Definitely," Sam had replied. But if they didn't have any classes together, didn't that mean that they'd have to see each other outside of school? Huh. Maybe he had more of a chance than he thought.


	2. Chapter 2

"Oh, hey, look. It's the new kids." Castiel looked up at the sound of Gabriel's voice and looked towards where he was pointing. Sure enough, Sam and Dean Winchester were standing at the concessions stand. They paid for their popcorn and then walked into the screening room that was playing Deadpool. Castiel grinned slyly at Gabriel.

"What a coincidence," he said. "They're seeing the same movie that we are. This movie is pretty popular, you know. Maybe the theatre will be so packed that we'll have no choice but to sit next to them."

"Shut up," Gabriel said good-naturedly as they grabbed their tickets from the apathetic-looking teen manning the ticket line. "We're not going to sit next to them if we can help it."

"Why not?" Castiel asked. "You do like him, don't you?"

"I guess," Gabriel said, even though he knew that he so totally did. "But I don't want to bother them. They're here to see the movie, not get stalked by us."

"Hmm." Castiel's face took on a skeptical expression but he didn't say anything else as they got their popcorn. Well, he got popcorn. Gabriel got Skittles, M&Ms, and a large Coke. It turned out that Castiel was at least half right. The theatre ended up being so packed that the only available seats were directly behind the Winchesters. Gabriel thoroughly enjoyed the movie, even though Castiel drank almost all of his Coke and half the time his eyes were drawn to the shaggy brown head sitting in front of him.

When the lights turned on just over an hour later, Gabriel tensed almost imperceptibly, sure that Sam would see him. He frowned. Was he hiding from someone he liked? Well, that was knew. Usually when he liked someone, he went out of his way to talk to them. Then again, the only person he'd ever dated was Kali, and his fling with her was not the best example of a functional relatio-

"Gabriel?"

Well, fuck.

"Hey, Sam," Gabriel said with a smile. Sam and Dean had, for some reason, turned around when they'd stood and seen Gabriel and Castiel still in their seats. Sam smiled at him while Dean looked just a little disinterested, though it was almost hidden behind polite interest. "Fancy meeting you here."

"I didn't know you like Marvel," Sam said. At Gabriel's side, Castiel was grinning hugely at him, and Gabriel reached out and shoved a handful of popcorn into his mouth to get him to stop.

"Yeah, well." Gabriel shrugged and ignored the glare Castiel was giving him, though the effect was ruined by his extended cheeks.

"I have to pee," he announced when he'd swallowed. "Dean, escort me to the bathroom." He stood up and grabbed Dean's arm, dragging him towards the exit before he could say anything. Dean had time to shoot Sam and Gabriel a confused and somewhat frightened look before he disappeared through the door. Sam turned a questioning gaze on Gabriel, who sighed.

"That was my best friend Castiel," he explained with the air of a parent whose child was the one twirling in the wrong direction during a ballet recital. "He's a little… special."

"Ah," said Sam. "Why did he need my brother to go with him to the bathroom?"

"We're the last ones in here, we'd better go," Gabriel said quickly, ignoring the question. Sam looked around and, sure enough, there was no one else in the room except for one nerd who was probably staying for the post-credits bonus scene. Gabriel grabbed his half-full bucket of popcorn and led the way out of the room.

He wondered whether or not Castiel had actually needed to pee. Although, he had consumed more soda than the human bladder was designed to hold, and if he wasn't already in the bathroom, he would be soon, so that's where Gabriel headed. He wasn't aware that Sam had followed him until he spoke up.

"So," Sam said, and Gabriel jumped from surprise.

"Christ, man, don't do that," he complained. Sam just grinned at him.

"Sorry," he said insincerely. "You never did answer my question."

"Hmm? Oh, right. I don't know, he probably just didn't want to get lost. Cas is strange like that." He hoped that Sam couldn't tell how uncomfortable he was. But he probably could, since he stopped prodding, probably figuring that Castiel was special needs or something and Gabriel was uncomfortable with talking about it.

When they got to the men's room, they found Dean leaning against the wall with his arms crossed and a scowl on his face.

"The little shit took my phone so I wouldn't leave," he explained when Sam raised an eyebrow at him. "Spouted off some bullshit about not getting in the way of true love."

Oh, dear God. Gabriel was going to kill Castiel. Slowly.

"Dean," Sam said, casting a meaningful look at Gabriel. He was obviously worried that Gabriel would get offended at Dean calling Castiel a shit, but Gabriel didn't even see it. He was heading for the only occupied stall, where he could see Castiel's shoes standing near the door.

"Come on out, bitch, before I come in and drag you out," he growled. The door opened slowly and Castiel stepped out, face expressionless.

"Was that threat necessary?" he asked calmly. Gabriel just held out a hand, tapping his foot impatiently. Castiel sighed, but rooted around in his pocket for Dean's phone. Gabriel took it with a sarcastic smile and handed it to Dean with an apologetic look on his face.

"Sorry about Castiel," he said. Then, to Castiel, "Stealing is not okay, mister! You're grounded."

"You can't ground me," Castiel said indignantly.

"You live under my roof, you live under my rules."

"Okay, first off, it's not your roof," Castiel said, rolling his eyes. "It's your dad's roof. Secondly, I don't even live with you, you idiot, I'm just staying at your place until your dad gets back"

He exited the bathroom and the other three followed. Sam looked amused at their exchange, but Dean just looked bored again. Gabriel wondered if he was allergic to smiling. _The specimen does not display any emotions other than boredom. Has some tragedy befallen him that renders him incapable of expressing happiness?_

"Whatever," Gabriel huffed. "Let's just get out of here and get some food. I'm starving."

"You just ate, you pig!" Castiel exclaimed. "And you're still eating that popcorn!"

Gabriel locked eyes with Castiel and dropped the tub of popcorn into a trash can as they passed. Castiel closed his eyes and took a deep breath.

"I don't understand how so much food can fit into such a small body without making you fat," he said.

"It's my superpower," he said. "And I'm not small."

"You are pretty small," Dean piped up.

"Well, so are you when compared to this big ass tree," Gabriel said, pointing up towards Sam. Dean grinned and Gabriel reassessed his earlier statement. _The specimen does indeed smile, though it seems that he won't unless given a reason, usually when others are made fun of._

"Where do you want to go eat?" Castiel asked, snapping Gabriel out of his thoughts.

Gabriel shrugged, and Castiel sighed.

"Pizza?"

"We had pizza last night."

"McDonald's?"

"No thanks, I'm not in the mood for fake food."

"Panera?"

"Actually," Gabriel said, tilting his head thoughtfully. "I could do Panera."

"So glad His Majesty has come to a decision," Castiel said sarcastically. As he spun on his heel and started towards the door, Gabriel heard him mutter, "I swear, it's like raising a five-year-old."

"I heard that!" Gabriel called. Castiel flipped him off in response, and Gabriel laughed as he turned to the Winchesters. "So. This is kinda awkward. Um, do you guys wanna come with?"

Dean opened his mouth, probably to say no, based on his skeptically raised eyebrow, but Sam beat him to it.

"Sure."

Dean rolled his eyes so hard that Gabriel was surprised they didn't pop out of his head and land at his feet.

"Great!" Gabriel led the way to the exits, and Dean grudgingly followed behind them. "The closest one is near the library. Do you know where the library is?"

"Uh…"

"Just follow me and Cas," Gabriel told him. They stepped out into the warm August air and Gabriel headed to where he could see Castiel impatiently waiting by his car. The Winchesters headed further down the row of cars in the parking lot, and Gabriel slipped into the passenger side of Castiel's car.

"What-" Castiel started.

"I asked them to come with us," Gabriel blurted out. Castiel stared at him. "I didn't wanna just make plans in front of them and then not invite them. That's so awkward."

"Did they accept?" Castiel asked. Gabriel nodded, and Castiel grinned. "Great. You asked out your crush."

"Oh, my God, shut up," Gabriel moaned. "I'm so stupid."

"Calm down," Castiel said as he pulled out of the parking lot. "I doubt even you can manage to fuck up a simple lunch." They pulled up to the light and a moment later a sleek black Chevy pulled up behind them. "Is that them?"

"I don't know. I'm not going to turn around to check," Gabriel said, crossing his arms and leaning back in his seat. Castiel rolled his eyes but didn't say anything. Fifteen minutes later, they were pulling into the parking lot of a large Panera Bread. The Chevy parked next to them and Sam and Dean got out. Sam smiled when he saw Gabriel, but Dean just looked (surprise!) bored. Whatever. Maybe the dude was having a bad day or something.

The four of them walked inside and got a table, and Sam and Castiel went to stand in line, leaving Dean and Gabriel in a frankly very awkward silence.

"So," Gabriel finally said. "When did you guys move here?"

"A week before school started," Dean said. The awkward silence returned, and even outgoing, charismatic Gabriel couldn't think of anything to say.

They both looked up, relieved, when Castiel and Sam returned with the food. Their relief must have shown on their faces, because Castiel raised an eyebrow as he handed Gabriel his plate.

"So, how did you guys like the movie?" Sam asked. He sat next to Dean, right across from Gabriel.

"I thought it was very good," Castiel said. "Though I felt like I was missing some things."

"Well, duh. You haven't even seen the first seven movies," Gabriel said, taking a small bite of his panini.

"It's a series?" Dean asked.

Sam nodded. "All Marvel movies are interconnected and can be watched as one huge series."

"If you wanna get technical, though," Gabriel said, "Deadpool is the eighth part of the X-Men series."

"Oh, really?" Sam asked. "I didn't know it was an X-Men movie."

"Yeah, Colossus and Negasonic Teenage Warhead weren't just making a cameo."

"I'm sorry, who?" Dean interrupted.

"Negasonic Teenage Warhead," Gabriel said. "Were you even paying attention during the movie?"

"Obviously not," Sam snorted. "He hasn't even ever seen a Marvel comic up close."

"Oh, my god, seriously?"

Castiel smirked at his side and tore off a piece of his baguette. "And you said you weren't a nerd," he said.

"I'm not a nerd. I'm a geek. There's a difference."

"What is that difference, pray tell?" he asked.

"Nerds are people who know a lot of things about a lot of things, or are really smart. Geeks are people like me who are super into comics, superheroes, video games, etcetera."

"Only a nerd would know the difference," Dean said.

"No," Sam protested. "That's like saying only a fruit would know the difference between a carrot and a banana."

Gabriel and Dean both snorted, and even Castiel had to clear his throat after almost choking on a mouthful of his water. After that, the awkwardness that had previously plagued them disappeared, and conversation flowed easily.

Almost an hour later, the four of them finally left after dumping their half-eaten food into the trash.

"This was fun," Sam said as they walked to their cars. Dean nodded in agreement. "We should do this again sometime."

"Sure," Gabriel agreed. He slipped into the driver's seat of his car. "See you at school," he said right before closing the door. Castiel slipped into the seat next to his and waited until the black Chevy had pulled away from the curb to turn to Gabriel expectantly.

"Well?" he prompted. Gabriel went over the last few hours in his head. Meeting Sam at the movies, going out to lunch with him, spending the entire hour discussing movies and comics and everything else, too. He let his head flop onto the steering wheel.

"I am so fucked."

…

Gabriel's dreams were dark and confusing that night, and when he woke up on Sunday morning all he could remember of them was a full moon and the glint of sharp claws. They weren't nightmares, strictly speaking, but his heart was pounding when he blinked himself awake. The clock on his dresser read 5:47 AM. Castiel was still asleep in his sleeping bag, but Gabriel knew he wouldn't be able to go back to sleep.

As quietly as possible, he slipped out of bed and crept to his bathroom. He took a quick , but still relaxing, hot shower, and then went back to his room to put on a pair of sweats and a large hoodie. He slipped socks onto his feet, and padded downstairs to the kitchen.

His favourite mug was the porcelain one with six golden wings wrapping around the white paint. After grabbing it from its spot in the cabinet, he filled it with milk and heated it up in the microwave. Hot chocolate mix was added next, and he stirred it in slowly as he made his way to his father's study.

Usually he wasn't allowed in there, but he'd always found the room comforting. Maybe it was because the room always smelled like paper and ink and Chuck, or maybe it was because the blinds were always drawn - and Gabriel had always preferred night to day - or maybe it was both of those things. He didn't particularly care at the moment.

He pulled a thick blanket out of the closet in the hallway on his way to the study, and he wrapped it around his shoulders as he sat in Chuck's worn leather armchair. Sipping at the hot chocolate, he sighed and tried to get rid of the feeling of anxiety that had settled deep in his bones after the unsettling dreams he'd just woken up from.

Already the images themselves were fading from his mind, but he remembered that there had been something dangerous in his mind's eye, something with sharp claws and dripping fangs. And the moon. He felt like the moon was significant, too.

Gabriel repressed a small shiver and took another gulp of his drink. He knew that he wouldn't be able to just forget the dream completely, so he did the next best thing. He analysed them.

Sharp claws and the moon could only mean one thing, really: werewolf. But that was just stupid. He'd never been afraid of werewolves. In fact, after reading and then watching the Twilight series, he'd grown to see werewolves as symbols of trashy teen romance, much like werewolves and depression (though that last one was pretty sad. He had friends with depression, and he hated how authors romanticized it).

And though werewolves themselves might not have scared him, the dreams had left a very uncomfortable feeling deep in his gut. Maybe it was just his brain's reaction to the movie the previous day. He didn't usually watch horror movies or anything with a ton of blood and gore in it, and Deadpool had been rated R for a reason. It had surprised him, that first bloody death, and maybe this was just his subconscious telling him to chill with the disturbing movies.

But why werewolves?

He took another sip from his mug. Maybe he was overanalyzing this. Maybe his brain had just come up with the first vaguely frightening thing it could as nightmare fuel. Whatever. He'd get over it in time.

He didn't know how long he sat there, but his hot chocolate was cold by the time Castiel came down and found him. He looked surprised to see Gabriel up, and he frowned slightly as he walked into the study.

"Are you okay?" he asked, and Gabriel started.

"Of course I am," he said. "Why wouldn't I be?"

Castiel shrugged and crossed his arms as he leaned against the doorframe.

"You look a little… unsettled. And in all the years I've known you, I've never seen you leave a hot chocolate unfinished."

Gabriel looked down and realized that he was still gripping the half-full mug. The heat that had previously comforted him was long gone, and he placed the mug on the desk.

"I'm fine," he assured Castiel. "Just had a weird dream and couldn't go back to sleep."

His friend looked satisfied with that answer and turned to go.

"Since you're up," he called over his shoulder as he walked to the kitchen, "you might as well help me with breakfast."

Gabriel grabbed the mug and wrapped the blanket tighter around his shoulders before following Castiel. He rinsed out the mug and put it in the dishwasher while Cas got out pancake mix and eggs, and then he started on omelettes.

"I have to go back home today," Castiel said as they worked. Gabriel glanced at him out of the corner of his eye. Castiel hadn't looked up from where he was mixing pancake batter, but his eyes were narrowed slightly. "I don't want you to be alone for the rest of the week, but my parents won't let me stay over on weekdays."

"It's cool, Cas," Gabriel said. He poured the egg mixture into the pan and listened to the satisfying sizzle. "I'll be fine. I'm used to it."

"I know. That's what I don't like." Castiel liked Chuck a lot, as he'd spent a lot of time over at the Shurley household, but everyone knew that he also resented him just the tiniest bit for constantly leaving Gabriel alone. Gabriel appreciated the sentiment, even if he rolled his eyes at how little faith Castiel had in his abilities to care for himself.

"It's _fine_ ," Gabriel said. "Seriously. It's not a big deal. He has to work, you know."

Castiel sighed. "I know. But I'm going to call you every night to make sure you do your homework and eat dinner, because God knows you won't if someone doesn't tell you to."

"Your faith in my abilities is astounding," Gabriel told him sarcastically. "But whatever. Let's eat."

…

It was thanks to the blanket around his shoulders that neither of them noticed it at first. Gabriel hadn't looked in the mirror when he'd been showering, and what bits of it could be seen even with a shirt on were covered with the blanket.

But twenty minutes after breakfast, when both of them were sitting on the floor of Gabriel's room playing chess, Gabriel let the blanket fall from his shoulders, and Castiel looked up at him and made a strangled sound in his throat.

"What?" Gabriel asked. Castiel's eyes were wide, and he was staring at something on Gabriel's arm. Confused, Gabriel looked down, too, and then he sucked in a sharp breath.

On his bicep, starting at just above his elbow and disappearing into his shirt, were thick, inky black markings that looked suspiciously like tattoos. They were kinda awesome, if Gabriel was being honest, but they had also not been there last night.

"What the fuck," he gasped, scrambling to his feet and dashing to the bathroom, Castiel hot on his heels. He stood in front of the mirror and ripped off his shirt, and his eyes got even wider, if that was even possible.

The markings didn't start at his elbow. They started at his back, as he found when he turned around. Right in the middle of his back, spreading out to cover his entire right shoulder blade, then up and over his shoulder, across the right side of his chest and down his arm, stopping just above his elbow and just above the waistband of his sweatpants. The lines were thick and jagged, and looked almost like a puzzle piece, with some parts of it sticking out, and some parts sweeping in.

He sucked in a sharp breath and turned to Castiel, who was staring at him with wide eyes. Hesitantly, he reached out and traced a finger along one of the swirlier lines. Gabriel wanted to smack his hand away, which surprised him. He and Castiel were usually very tactile in their friendship, but for some reason, he hated even the thought of his friend touching the marks.

"Gabriel," Castiel said in a deceptively calm voice. He looked at Gabriel and his eyes were wide and confused. "Did you get a tattoo last night?"

"What?" Gabriel scowled and stepped back, and Castiel's hand fell to his side. "Of course not! I didn't have anything to do with this."

"You expect me to believe that they just appeared on their own?" Castiel's voice was skeptical, and Gabriel found that he didn't have a good answer, because as crazy as it sounded, that was exactly what happened. So instead of replying, he turned back to the mirror and studied the marks some more.

"I kinda like 'em," he said. "They make me look so badass. Well, even more badass than before."

"Please," Cas snorted. "You're the least badass person I know. And stop trying to distract me, because this is serious!"

"Not everything is about you, you know," Gabriel quipped. "You think you're freaked out? I'm the one with freaky magic tattoos."

"They're not magic. Magic isn't real," Castiel snapped. He frowned and tilted his head. "There has to be an explanation for this."

Still muttering to himself, he turned and walked back to Gabriel's bedroom, presumably to look this up. Gabriel turned around so that he could see the marks on his back. He really liked them, now that the shock had worn off.

Well, almost worn off. He was still half-convinced that he'd wake up and find that this was all a dream. But on the other hand, he wouldn't be too surprised if this did end up being magic. Chuck hadn't really discouraged his son's enthusiasm about magic and fae and the like when Gabriel was a kid, instead only encouraging him to go out and find it.

Gabriel had had to learn from his friends that magic wasn't real when he was in second grade, but he'd still never truly stopped believing. Logically, he knew that it was improbable that such things existed, but there wasn't any proof. A lack of proof isn't proof against it, as his father had told him once.

Maybe he was a fae or something. Gabriel grinned as he tugged his shirt back on. That would be so cool! He had to go find a plant to see if he could influence it. He switched off the bathroom light and went to go find Castiel.


	3. Chapter 3

Much to Gabriel's disappointment, he did not suddenly discover the ability to make plants grow. That wasn't for lack of trying, though. Castiel found him in the backyard, where he was trying to make the tree taller.

"Gabriel," he called from the doorway. "Come on, let's go see if those marks will wash off."

Gabriel turned to him with wide eyes. "Why would I want to wash them off? This is the coolest thing that's ever happened to me!"

No amount of threats, persuasion, or bribery could get Gabriel to agree, so Castiel was forced to resort to drastic measures. After a chase that lasted twenty minutes and woke up anyone in the neighborhood unfortunate enough to still be sleeping, Cas managed to pin Gabriel down on his bed and use his belt to tie his hands to the headboard so he couldn't escape.

"Kinky," Gabriel told him. "Who knew that underneath that stoic, sarcastic exterior lay a horndog with a raging BDSM kink?"

"Do me a favour," Castiel said, "and shut the fuck up."

He left and came back a few minutes later, holding a hand towel, a bowl of water, and what appeared to be the entire contents of Gabe's bathroom. Plain water didn't work, and neither did any of the soaps. Rubbing alcohol only served to aggravate a cut on Gabriel's arm, and hydrogen peroxide did nothing but stain the white towel.

Castiel was determined, though, and didn't admit defeat until he'd been scrubbing at the marks for so long that Gabriel was beginning to fall asleep again. Finally, he sat back with a huge sigh and tossed the towel down. Gabriel raised an eyebrow.

"Giving up already?" he asked. "Seriously? Come on, you've only succeeding in rubbing my arm raw."

"Why are you not more worried about this?" Castiel asked him, ignoring Gabriel's comments. "Seriously. Why doesn't this freak you out? I mean, waking up with tattoos that you didn't go out and get, tattoos that just appeared on your skin like… like…"

"Like magic?" Gabriel supplied. "I don't know, Cas. It's just… strange things have been happening to me my whole life, you know that. Do you remember that one time we found that faerie wing in my dad's office?"

"I thought we agreed that that was fake," Cas said. "Supernatural shit like that doesn't exist." But there was a hint of doubt in his voice.

"Well, people thought that giant squids didn't exist until someone caught one," Gabriel pointed out. "Just because we haven't seen anything yet doesn't mean it's not out there."

Castiel rubbed at his temples and sighed again. "How are you going to hide these from your dad?" he asked softly. "And the people at school?"

"I'll just wear a jacket or something."

"All the time?"

"If I need to. You know my dad's pretty chill about most things, but even he won't believe that the markings just appeared out of the blue. Now, can you untie me? I've lost all feeling in my arms."

…

The following day, Gabriel did indeed pull a jacket on over his t-shirt as he left the house. He knew that he'd regret it later, especially once the sun was all the way up, but covering the marks was just a little more important than not being sweaty.

Castiel had left the previous night after dinner. His parents were pretty lenient when it came to how much time he spent at Gabriel's house, but they did have one rule: no sleepovers on school nights.

His friend had kept his promise, though, and called Gabriel around six to wake him up so that he'd have enough time to get ready for school. And an hour and a half later, Gabriel was still half asleep when he turned on his car and backed out of the driveway.

He hated Mondays, he really did. They were just so… gross. If days were people, Monday would be that sick little shit that hated kids and spent all his time torturing cats. Actually, if days were people, Monday would be dead because no one likes it and someone would have shot it in the fucking head as soon as it crawled out of the depths of hell from whence it came.

Gabriel sighed. He really hated Mondays. There was nothing good about Mondays at all. It was tragic, frankly.

The ride to school seemed longer than its normal fifteen minutes, and by the time he got there he was already ready to go back home and sleep. But he persevered. He grabbed his bag and his coffee and walked onto the campus with his head held high.

It wasn't all bad because, being Gabriel, he couldn't really stay in a bad mood for too long. Passing by many friends on the way to his locker helped raise his spirits, and he was considerably more cheerful when he finally got to his destination. Castiel was waiting for him there, and he eyes the giant coffee in Gabriel's hand with raised eyebrows.

"Caffeine is so bad for you," he said, just like he did every morning. And just like every morning, Gabriel flipped him off as he took a huge gulp, ignoring how it scorched his tongue. "Please tell me that's not the only thing you ate this morning."

"Okay, I won't tell you," Gabriel said cheekily.

"Gabriel," Cas sighed, sounding very exasperated.

"I'm kidding, calm down. I had waffles."

"Hmm," Castiel said. "Is you dad still AWOL?"

"Yup," Gabriel told him cheerfully. "Hasn't called or anything."

Castiel gave him a sad look. "Gabriel…"

"Forget it," Gabriel sighed. "It doesn't matter."

The two of them started walking towards their first class. They'd signed up for most of the same classes, and so their schedules were more or less the same. In fact, the only periods that they didn't share were second period and sixth period, which happened to be their electives.

Mr. Burns' room looked just like every other math room in the public school system. There were colourful posters covering every available inch of wall, all of them boasting cheesy sayings like 'Math: The only subject that counts' and 'Don't discus infinity with a mathematician. You'll never hear the end of it'. The whiteboards were constantly covered in advertisements for school plays, clubs, and sporting events, and the teacher's desk was messy and covered with paper and empty water bottles.

Mr. Burns lived up to his intimidating name rather well, in Gabriel's opinion. The man stood at at least six foot five, and he had huge shoulders, huge hands, Resting Bitch Face, and an unfortunate love of leather jackets, leather boots, and wallet chains. Despite his appearance, though, Mr. Burns was a really nice dude.

He greeted Castiel and Gabriel cheerfully when they walked into the classroom, and they slipped into their seats just as the bell rang.

"Good morning, class!" Mr. Burns said once the chattering had died down. "I hope you all had good weekends, and came to school refreshed and ready to learn!"

Gabriel liked Mr. Burns, he really did, but there were times when even Gabriel's patience and legendary love of people was tested by his unfailing ability to treat anyone like a first grader.

"Give me a reason not to commit," Gabriel whispered to Castiel.

"There's no Starbucks in the afterlife," Castiel said. Gabriel's eyes widened and he eyed his paper Starbucks cup.

"That'll do."

…

By the time lunch rolled around, Gabriel was in a much better mood than he'd been in when he'd woken up. It helped that he'd gotten his most hated subjects out of the way first, though of course he hadn't seen it that way when he'd been forced to sit through them.

He and Castiel met up with their friend Balthazar on their walk from their chemistry class to the cafeteria. He appeared to be waiting for them, and when he saw them he made his way straight to them, cutting through the crowd like he was a hot knife and the other kids were butter. Honestly, though, that wasn't that hard for him to do. The football team, of which Balthazar was a part, was pretty nice, but they were also damn intimidating. Not to Gabriel, though. He was friends with all of them.

"Hey, guys!" Balthazar said when he reached them, his voice just as British as Gabriel remembered it to be. "Castiel, do you think you could help me with something?"

"What do you need?" Castiel asked.

"A tutor." Balthazar's smile was apologetic, and he ran a hand through his blonde hair with what appeared to be agitation. "If I don't end the semester with at least a C in all my classes, I get kicked off the football team, and I'm kinda depending on that to get me into college."

"Trust us, we know," Gabriel said playfully. "There's no way you're getting in on an academic scholarship."

Balthazar flipped Gabriel off, but there was a smile on his face.

"Sure, I can help you, though I can't guarantee that I'm any good at tutoring," Castiel said. "What's the subject?"

"Algebra 2 trig."

"Oh, I'm actually good at math. Um, when do you have free time?"

Balthazar narrowed his eyes as he thought. "Not after school, definitely not before school," he muttered. "Does lunch work for you?"

"I'm not really doing anything, but…" Castiel looked towards Gabriel with furrowed brows.

"It's cool," he said. "You may be my best friend, but you aren't my only friend. I'll find someone to sit with."

"Are you sure?" Cas asked.

"Positive."

"Alright," Castiel said after a moment. He and Balthazar turned and started walking towards the cafeteria, and Cas offered Gabriel a smile as he passed. When they were out of sight, Gabriel turned around and started heading towards the back of the school.

He hadn't exactly lied to Castiel. He did have many other friends, but he didn't particularly feel like company just then. Strange for a social butterfly such as him, but everyone had off days. Today just happened to be one of his.

And besides, the library was a really nice place to eat lunch. The chairs were comfortable, it was quiet, air conditioned, and the librarian was pretty laid back about food and drinks near the books.

When he got there, it at first appeared that the library was empty. After waving to tiny Mrs. Gladstone behind the checkout counter, he headed immediately for the back, where he knew a small table was hidden behind the mythology shelf.

There was already someone sitting there, though, and Gabriel stopped when he recognized Sam's shaggy head. The brunette hadn't noticed him yet, too absorbed in whatever book he was reading, and he appeared to be operating on autopilot as far as eating went, placing fries into his mouth and chewing them almost mechanically. He was displaying all the signs of someone who was trapped in the trance that came only from getting lost in a good book, from the relaxed muscles yet sharp eyes, hunched over sitting position, and unnaturally tight grip on the book.

It was fascinating.

Despite how much he liked to read, Gabriel had never been able to distance himself from reality enough to put himself in such a trance. He was always at least semi-aware of his surroundings and what was going on at any time, and so he took this opportunity to study the bookworm in its natural habitat and wonder if he would've looked like that had he been able to go into a reading trance.

As quietly as he could, he slipped into the chair across from Sam's and pulled a bag of pretzels from his backpack. He also pulled out his phone and started the stopwatch function, just to see how long it would take Sam to notice that he was there.

He had consumed almost one pound of pretzels and somewhere around eight ounces of water in the fifteen minutes it took Sam to look up and realize he wasn't alone. Gabriel had taken to doodling while he waited, and the piece of paper in front of him had on it a very realistic drawing of Sam on it. Well, mostly the top of Sam's head, since that was what he was presenting to Gabriel in his hunched over state, but also the way his eyelashes stood in stark contrast to his skin, and how he'd caught a tiny bit of his lip between teeth.

It was a while after Sam noticed him that Gabriel noticed that Sam had noticed. He looked up from where he was shading in Sam's cheekbone to find that the object of his drawing was staring at him with a small smirk on his face. Gabriel's eyes widened and he felt his cheeks heating up at being caught.

"Um," he said, "hi."

"Hi," Sam said back, sounding way too amused. "Is that me?"

Gabriel slowly slid the drawing from the tabletop to his binder. "Maybe. Maybe not. It might even be a moose. Who knows?"

Sam chuckled and closed his book. "How long have you been sitting here?"

Gabriel checked his phone. "About seventeen minutes. You know, for a guy who looks so much like a puppy, you have atrocious hearing."

"I look like a puppy," Sam repeated disbelievingly. "That's ironic." That last bit was muttered to himself, but Gabriel still heard it anyway.

"Why is that ironic?" he asked. Sam looked surprised, and deflected the question.

"Um, no reason. So, um, what are you doing here? I didn't know you come to the library during lunch."

"I don't usually," Gabriel told him. "But today Castiel is tutoring our friend Balthazar and Cas was the only person whose company I can handle right now, so I decided to avoid the masses and come here instead."

"You handled me well enough," Sam pointed out.

"Well, you weren't even doing anything," Gabriel countered. "Who knows? Maybe I'll hate you now that you're once again in the land of the living." His words were kinda harsh, but the blow was softened by his teasing tone and smile.

"I hope not," said Sam. "I actually enjoy your company, and it would be a damn shame if you ended up hating me."

Gabriel smiled. "I enjoy your company, too."

…

It turned out that Gabriel enjoyed Sam's company a lot. He found himself laughing so hard during with his lunch that he feared he was actually at risk of busting a lung. A few minutes after the bell had rung, signalling the end of lunch, Gabriel was still smiling even after he had met up with Castiel again in their U.S. history class.

"You look happy," Castiel said when he slipped into his seat. "Did you eat with Anna?"

"Sam, actually," Gabriel said nonchalantly. Castiel was not fooled, and his eyes narrowed as he zeroed in on Gabriel like a hawk spotting a black snake against the backdrop of red sand. And, wow, what was with the shitty comparisons?

"Oh?" Cas asked slyly. "And I take it you had fun?"

"Yes, I had fun. Why wouldn't I? He's a fun dude." Maybe if he was lucky, Castiel would get the hint and shut up about Sam. Pfft, yeah right. Gabriel was about as lucky as thirteen black cats breaking a mirror underneath a ladder while opening an umbrella inside and dammit! Again with the metaphors?

"Mm hmm," Castiel said skeptically, but he thankfully turned to the front of the room when the bell rang and left Gabriel alone. He knew he should be paying attention to his teacher, but he found that he couldn't concentrate. He kept replaying the past half hour over and over in his head, thinking about the dimples that had appeared in Sam's cheeks when he smiled, how his eyes had crinkled up slightly at the corners, the way he'd tilted his head down when he laughed.

He didn't realize that he'd started smiling dopily or was staring at the ceiling until Castiel poked him in the side, hard. Gabriel jolted and sat up, looking at the clock in confusion. Had it already been thirty minutes? Class was going to be over in another twenty, which meant that he'd missed most of whatever they were talking about, and would have to go home and look it up himself.

"Gabriel, are you okay?" Castiel asked quietly, his concern evident in his voice. Gabriel rubbed at his eyes and sighed.

"Absolutely not," he said. He'd known he was screwed before, but this was even worse than he'd thought.

* * *

He had another strange dream that night. It was much clearer, though, than the first one. In it, he was running from something- or towards something, he couldn't tell. He felt like he was running for hours, but at the same time he only ran for a few seconds. His destination was safety, he knew, and when he finally reached it, he saw nothing but gleaming green eyes and glinting claws and wicked sharp fangs and thick fur.

He had never felt safer.

He woke on Tuesday morning with a smile on his face and a pounding heart, and he didn't think he'd be able to go back to sleep, even though it was only four AM. After taking a quick shower, he went down to the kitchen and made himself a cup of hot chocolate. He didn't want to dwell on this dream like he had the last one. Everytime he did, the markings on his back tingled, and though it didn't hurt, it was just an uncomfortable reminder of something he didn't want to think about just then.

The house was silent as he padded back to his room. Had he not been used to it, it would've seemed intimidating. That was the only benefit to his father almost never being home. Silence didn't bother him, though on the opposite side of the coin, he had a huge dislike - bordering on phobia, actually - of being alone.

Oh, well. You couldn't win them all.

He settled carefully on his bed and took out the book he was steadily working his way through. He'd never wished more that he could lose himself in a good book like so many people seemed to be able to. If ever he needed a distraction, it was now.

Pulling the blankets tighter around his shoulders, he opened the book and began to read.


	4. Chapter 4

Exactly two weeks after Chuck left, he was back in Gabriel's life as if he'd never been absent in the first place. When he came back from school that Friday, it was to find Chuck leaning against the counter in the kitchen, sipping at what looked like a glass of whiskey.

"Hey," he said casually.

Gabriel sighed internally, but on the outside he offered his father a small smile.

"Hey," he replied. "What time did you get back?"

"A few hours ago. I can't really remember, I passed out almost as soon as I got back," Chuck said. Gabriel dropped his backpack down at the foot of the staircase and walked over to the fridge. Pulling out a water bottle, he turned to look at his father with a raised eyebrow.

"Is the alcohol really necessary?" he asked. Chuck nodded.

"Absolutely. You have no idea the kind of shit I had to deal with these past two weeks."

"Do you wanna tell me, then?" Gabriel asked slyly.

"Nice try, Gabriel," Chuck said. "You know I can't tell you what I do."

"Why not? Do you work for the government?"

It was an old conversation, one that they'd had every few weeks since Gabriel was old enough to be curious about what his father did. Every time Gabriel asked, Chuck would deflect or change the subject. It was only recently that he started giving straight answers, and even those were to just tell Gabriel that he couldn't say anything. Gabriel was pretty sure it was a government job, no matter what Chuck said. What else could require him to be away from home so much but also pay well enough to keep them comfortably well off financially?

"No, I do not work for the government," Chuck said. "I might tell you when you're old enough. If you're good."

"Dad, I'm sixteen," Gabriel said, rolling his eyes. "Stop treating me like a five-year-old."

"Well, only a five-year-old would continue to ask the same questions over and over, so I'll stop treating you like a five-year-old when you start acting your age. Do you know what the definition of insanity is according to Einstein? Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."

He gave Gabriel a meaningful look and sipped at the liquid in his glass. Gabriel huffed petulantly.

"I am not insane," he said. "You're insane if you think that I'm going to be satisfied with that bullshit answer."

"Gabriel, language," Chuck admonished lightly. "Don't you have homework that you need to go do?"

"No," Gabriel said. "But since you're so desperate to get rid of me, I'll go hang out with Cas or something."

"Have fun!" Chuck called as he walked back out the front door after grabbing his phone, keys, and wallet. A part of him was stung that Chuck hadn't tried to stop him or deny trying to get rid of him, but another part - a bigger part - pushed that first part down and revelled in the freedom that having a borderline neglectful father gave him.

He decided to text Sam and see if he wanted to hang out. Over the past two weeks, he and Gabriel had gotten extremely close. Close enough that he and Dean sat with Castiel and Gabriel every day at lunch, and the four of them would even hang out sometimes after school or on the weekends. They were becoming a very tight-knit group.

A few minutes later, he got a text back from Sam saying that he could hang out, and the two of them made plans to meet up at a nearby Baskin Robbins. Before he headed over there, though, Gabriel made the five minute drive to Castiel's house and beeped the horn on his car obnoxiously until Cas' sister Anna came out to yell at him.

"What do you want, you fuck?" she snapped when she'd reached his car.

"I want a lot of things, squirt," he said. "But right now, I'll settle for your brother."

She growled angrily at him and stomped back up the driveway to the house, and a few moments later, Castiel emerged. He was wearing his stupid tan trenchcoat over his black jeans and white button up, which meant that he hadn't planned on leaving the house today. He didn't say anything to Gabriel until he was buckled up in the passenger seat.

"Where are we going?" he asked as Gabriel pulled away from the curb.

"Baskin Robbins," Gabriel answered. "We're gonna meet Sam there."

Castiel narrowed his eyes but comment, for which Gabriel was grateful. Ever since that Monday two weeks ago when he'd sat with Sam in the library during lunch, Gabriel had tried to make sure that he was alone with Sam as little as possible. If there was at least one other person with them when they hung out, Gabriel was less likely to do something stupid like try to kiss Sam. His crush had only gotten worse as he'd spent time with the Winchesters, and Castiel knew it, which was why he was usually willing to accompany him and Sam on their almost-dates.

A few minutes later, they were pulling into the parking lot of the Baskin Robbins. Sam had already got his ice cream, it looked like, and was sitting on the hood of Dean's Impala as he ate it. Knowing that Dean would never willingly give up his car unless it was for an emergency, Gabriel looked around, knowing that Dean couldn't be far away. Sure enough, he spotted the older Winchester coming out of the building a few second later.

Castiel and Gabriel exited the car and walked up to their classmates.

"You couldn't have waited?" Gabriel asked, his hand flying up to his chest dramatically. "I'm hurt."

Sam rolled his eyes at the theatrics. "Well, you were taking so long that we got hungry. It's your own fault, you know."

"I was being a good person, Sammy. Do you think Castiel would have liked to miss out on all this deliciousness?" Gabriel asked.

"Actually-" Cas started.

"No!" Gabriel exclaimed. "No, he wouldn't."

Narrowing his eyes at Sam and shaking his head in a disappointed manner, he dragged a sighing Castiel up to the door of the ice cream shop and led them inside.

"Was that necessary?" Castiel asked as they got into the line.

"Is anything necessary?" Gabriel retorted, but Castiel was not fooled. He glared until the smaller man relented. "My filter turns off whenever I'm around him. Don't ask me why, 'cause I don't know."

"Gabriel, you don't have a filter to turn off," Castiel pointed out.

"True."

After they got their ice cream (Castiel got rainbow sherbet on a sugar cone, and Gabriel got two scoops of Splish Splash in a cup with gummy bears and both kinds of sprinkles), they walked back outside to where the Winchesters were waiting.

"So, why did you want to meet up?" Sam asked when everyone was settled. "Did something happen?"

"Why would you assume that something happened?" Gabriel asked. "Can't I just want to spend time with you nerds?"

"Dude, we got out of school not even half an hour ago," Dean pointed out.

Gabriel gasped in mock shock. "You can count? This is amazing! You've progressed farther than I ever expected you to!"

Castiel, Dean, and Sam exchanged looks, obviously seeing right through his pathetic attempt at deflecting, but he ignored them and went on to rant about Dean's progress until the older Winchester shut him up by shoving a spoonful of ice cream down his throat.

* * *

The sun was already starting to set by the time Gabriel got home that evening. He was in a much better mood than before, thanks mostly to his friends' willingness to drop the subject of whatever was bothering him after he'd threatened to smear his ice cream across the Impala's backseat.

Chuck wasn't anywhere downstairs when he got back, so he climbed up the stairs and headed for the master bedroom. He could hear rustling sounds coming from the room, sounding hurried and slightly frantic.

Gabriel was almost his in the face by a flying pair of jeans as he walked through the door, and he watched, wide-eyed, as Chuck flew around his room, grabbing clothes from his drawers and closet and throwing them into a suitcase on the bed.

"Are you leaving again?" Gabriel asked, dismayed. Chuck barely spared him a glance as he walked into his bathroom.

"'Fraid so, Gabe," he said. "I just got another call from my boss. She needs me for… something."

Gabriel's jaw dropped and he felt anger start to flash just underneath his skin.

"Are you kidding me?" he practically shouted, and Chuck froze. "You just got back!"

"I know, Gabriel," Chuck said soothingly. "But this is really important."

"More important than me?" Gabriel snarled. "I'm your son! You can't keep doing this to me!"

"Gabriel." Chuck sounded shocked at Gabriel's outburst, but he wasn't done yet.

"You can't keep fucking off doing god knows what without telling me shit about it and then expect me to just accept it. Last time I asked what you do for a living, you told me to trust you, right? Well, how can I trust you when you don't trust me? Don't you care about what this is doing to me?"

"Gabriel," Chuck said again, but he was ignored.

"I'm pretty sure I have some pretty epic abandonment issues thanks to you." Gabriel managed to scoff out a laugh, though it sounded weak even to his own ears. "Do you know how many times I was scared as a kid that one day you'd just not come home?"

"I'd never do that to you," Chuck protested weakly.

"You might as well have!" Gabriel growled. "You're never home, and when you are, you're too tired or whatever to do anything with me besides have dinner sometimes!"

"Gabriel!" Chuck crossed the room and put his hands on Gabriel's shoulders, forcing his son to look at him. "I'm sorry. I am. I had no idea that this affected you so much."

Gabriel narrowed his eyes and sneered. "You didn't know that being gone for more than half the year every year since I was nine would leave some effects?"

"I'm sorry that I was such a bad father to you." Chuck dropped his hands and fished his phone out of his pocket.

"What are you doing?" Gabriel asked.

"I owe you an explanation, big time," Chuck said, dialing a number and holding the phone to his ear. "And I can't do that unless I'm here. Hey, Becky. Listen, something's come up. I can't do the case… Yes, I'm sure. Are there other hunters who can take care of it?... Great… Yeah, I know I owe you. Okay. Bye."

He hung up and took a deep breath as he faced Gabriel again.

"You might want to sit down for this," he said.

* * *

Gabriel couldn't sleep that night. At all. Although his body was exhausted and his eyes were closed, his mind just wouldn't stop going over everything that he'd learned that afternoon.

Chuck was a hunter. A fucking monster hunter, to be precise. That's why he was rarely home, because he was always out saving people from werewolves and witches and whatever else actually existed.

Gabriel wasn't as shocked as he maybe could have been. When you already half believed in magic and things that others didn't think existed, it wasn't that hard to accept the fact that almost everything he'd seen in old horror movies - and many things that he hadn't - were real.

"It's why I let you believe in magic instead of discouraging you," Chuck had said. "Because I knew that one day I'd have to tell you, and it would be easier to build upon a belief already there than try to start a new one."

And although it didn't surprise Gabriel (much), it had still freaked him out. How was he supposed to feel safe knowing that ghosts and wendigos and malicious gods actually roamed the planet? That's what he had asked Chuck earlier, and his father had promised to spend the weekend educating him on everything supernatural and how to defend himself.

"You won't be allowed to hunt under any circumstances," Chuck had told him firmly. "That's not the kind of life I want for you. No, this is just a precaution. It'd make me feel better if you knew how to defend yourself."

And so the following day, they'd start his _training_.

Gabriel turned over so that he was lying on his side and pulled the blanket up over his head. Maybe if it was dark enough, he'd be able to sleep. His eyes closed and he slowed his breathing down, trying to mimic what his body would do when - if - he fell asleep. Maybe it would help.

* * *

He was so thankful that it was Saturday when he woke up the next morning. He'd slept in until almost eleven, but despite the fact that he'd gone to bed at the perfectly reasonable time of ten the night before, he still felt exhausted. He'd had another dream, and was pretty sure that he had some legitimate psychological problems. There was just no other explanation for why he kept dreaming about giant freaky wolves and waking up with a smile on his face.

This dream wasn't like the ones before. Instead of flashes of teeth and claws and fur, he'd gotten an entire picture. All he could remember was Sam. Sam with glowing hazel eyes and extended canines and a dangerously predatory look on his face. Not only did Gabriel wake up with an unfortunate erection, he also knew now that adorably puppy-like Sam could be freaking scary when he wanted to be.

And it was hot as fuck.

Wait, did he just refer to Sam as both adorable and hot in the same five seconds?

Sighing, Gabriel let his eyes close again. He'd known he was screwed before, but now he knew that he was majorly screwed when it came to his crush - which he was starting to suspect was just a little bit more.

Absolutely screwed. And not in the fun way, unfortunately.


	5. Chapter 5

After taking a rather long and relaxing shower, Gabriel, hair still dripping onto his t-shirt, walked downstairs to find himself some breakfast. Chuck was already up and cooking. Standing in front of the stove in nothing but a pair of sweatpants, he had his back turned to Gabriel as he flipped bacon and scrambled eggs.

Gabriel couldn't help but stare at the man's back. He'd seen the scars before, of course, the most recent time being a few years ago when they'd gone to the beach. Chuck had just said that he was super accident prone as a kid and got hurt a lot, and Gabriel had believed him. But now he knew what his father really did when he wasn't home, and he couldn't help but wondering: How many thing had Chuck killed? How many had tried to kill him? How many times had Gabriel almost lost his parent?

He swallowed and pushed back such thoughts. It wouldn't do to dwell on things he'd had no control over.

"Morning," he said as he stepped into the kitchen.

"Morning," Chuck replied. "Sleep well?"

No. "Yeah."

"Good." Gabriel grabbed plates and glasses from the cabinet and helped Chuck dole out the food, and then the two of them migrated to the dining room.

"So, what's on the agenda for today?" Gabriel asked cheerfully. He couldn't really contain his excitement at having his father to himself for a weekend, without exhaustion or more work getting in the way. Chuck smiled at his enthusiasm.

"Homework," he said.

"But I didn't get any homework yesterday," Gabriel reminded him, confused.

"I know. I'm assigning this to you. You want to learn all there is to know about the supernatural, right?" Gabriel nodded. "Then you're going to have to do your research."

Groaning, Gabriel slumped down in his chair. "I hate research."

Chuck made a sympathetic noise as he shoveled more eggs into his mouth. "I know you do. But it's not boring, I promise. You don't have to memorize any dates or names."

"I guess it's better than actual school work," Gabriel admitted grudgingly.

"Right? Now, hurry up and eat your breakfast so we can get started."

Gabriel rolled his eyes but complied, and not even twenty minutes later, they were sitting on the couch in Chuck's office, with a thick binder between them. It was plain black, three inches thick, and filled almost completely with papers. It looked like something Gabriel would have carried around at school a few years ago, but when he opened it, the first page rather loudly declared "Chuck Shurley's Guide To Not Getting Killed By Supernatural Bullshit" in bright green ink, with little silver stars scattered across the paper.

"Are you five?" Gabriel asked him, raising an eyebrow.

"No, but I was bored when I did that," Chuck answered. "And that's not what you should be focusing on. Turn the page." Gabriel did, and found what looked to be a table of contents.

"Is this supposed to be a book?"

"It was going to be, but then I decided that putting all of this in a binder would be easier, in case we ever need to add to it," Chuck said. "In here you'll find everything I know about every supernatural species I've ever come across, including things like what they feed on, where they live, how to kill them, etcetera."

Gabriel flipped to a random page - vampires, apparently - and couldn't help the widening of his eyes. The page was mostly typed out, with a few paragraphs of information set alongside pictures that looked like they could have been taken from the scene of a horror movie. In bright blue ink, all over the page, were annotations in Chuck's familiar, messy scrawl. The biggest one on the page proclaimed, "Vampires DO NOT sparkle, dammit!" "DO NOT" was underlined five times.

"When did you have time to make this?" Gabriel wondered, flipping to another random page. This one contained information about something called a crocotta.

"After hunts, usually," said Chuck. "They usually last only a week at most."

"But you're never gone for less than two weeks," Gabriel pointed out.

"I always used the extra week to heal, and while I did that, I usually worked on this. It only took me about two years to make it."

"How long have you been planning to tell me about this stuff?"

Chuck shrugged and scratched at his scruff. "A few years, at least. Actually, now that I'm thinking about it, it was probably back when I was hunting those vampires in… '09, I think. One of them could smell you on me and started talking about how good he thought you'd taste. It kinda freaked me out, and that's when I decided that it would be a good idea to teach you to defend yourself."

Gabriel shuddered at his father's words, but managed to disguise the motion as a stretch. "And when were you going to tell me about all this?" he asked.

"Probably after you'd graduated high school," Chuck admitted. "I didn't want to freak you out too early. I wanted to give you at least a normal childhood."

"Thanks," Gabriel said sarcastically. He looked back down at the binder and closed it. "So, I should probably start reading this, huh?"

"Great idea," Chuck said with a thin smile on his face.

* * *

Gabriel started reading immediately, and found himself so lost within the contents of the binder that he completely missed lunch and didn't even look up until he blinked and realized that he could no longer see the words on the paper due to darkness. It was almost seven, and he'd been sitting in the same position for just under eight hours straight, with only the occasional stretch to relieve his aching muscles. He was surprised that he'd lost track of time so completely, as he'd never been able to do that before.

He'd made it all the way to Chapter Twenty-Nine, which contained information about crocotta. The first chapter had been a general overview of the supernatural world, and all the other chapters had contained information about what Chuck had labeled "easy or easy-ish" to hunt, things like ghosts, ghouls, vampires, djinn, and werewolves. According to the table of contents, the last ten or so chapters were devoted entirely to the so-called "freaky religious bullshit", with information about angels and demons from Christian lore, as well as information about gods from other religions, Pagan gods, and the like.

It was fascinating - the most interesting thing Gabriel had ever read, frankly - and he was reluctant to stop reading, but his stomach was growling insistently at him, so he closed the binder and headed downstairs in search of food.

The house was silent as Gabriel walked through it, and none of the lights were on. In the semidarkness, he felt his way to the kitchen and flicked on the light. The window above the sink faced the driveway, and revealed that Chuck's car was gone. Gabriel's mind filled immediately with assumptions - _he'd left again, gone on another stupid hunt, and he'd promised that he would stay this time, how could he have lied_ \- but he pushed them down and checked his phone.

There was one text on it, and it was from Chuck. Apparently, he'd gone to get something for dinner and would be back by seven. The text had only been sent a few minutes prior, so Gabriel relaxed and set the binder down on the counter.

He figured that he deserved a break, considering that he'd done nothing but read for the past few hours. He still had about fifteen minutes until Chuck was due back - if it was taking him this long to get food, he must have been going to that sandwich place he loved so much - so Gabriel decided to go for a quick walk to try and work the stiffness out of his cramped muscles.

But it was pretty dark outside already, and he couldn't fully repress a shiver at the thought of going out and encountering one of the things he'd just read about. Standing in the kitchen, staring out the window, he debated. On the one hand, he was not at all qualified to protect himself if something happened. On the other hand, just because he now knew that these things existed didn't mean that they'd all of a sudden attack him, and he _really_ wanted to go out.

So, he compromised. He drew a quick anti-possession symbol on the inside of his wrist using a Sharpie, threw a salt shaker into his pocket, and grabbed the silver switchblade Chuck had gotten him for his thirteenth birthday ("You never know, Gabriel. It'll make me feel better if you have at least some way to protect yourself. Why is it made of silver? Um, because it looks cool, that's why.").

It was the best he could do under such short circumstances, and Gabriel made a mental note to ask Chuck how to properly defend himself as soon as he could. The night air was cool when he stepped out of the house and locked the door behind him. It was early September, and he could smell winter approaching every time he breathed in.

He zipped up his jacket and set off at a brisk walk towards the tiny park at the corner of his street. As he walked, he found himself wondering why he'd ever been so worried about coming outside. There were plenty of street lights along the sidewalk, the moon was bright, and he even passed a few other people who were out walking their dogs.

Once he got to the park, he sat down on one of the swings and pushed himself idly with his feet. It was quiet, especially with the thick copse of trees surrounding the park muffling everything, but he could still make out the faint sounds of life all around him. There were two dogs barking somewhere to his left, a car turning on behind him, and crickets everywhere.

He sat until he got a text from Chuck telling him to come home, and then he reluctantly pulled himself up and started heading back home.

"Where were you?" Chuck asked when he walked through the door.

"At the park," Gabriel answered. He sniffed the air and could make out the smell of warm bread and melted cheese, but he couldn't make out exactly what kind of sandwich he was smelling. "What did you get?"

"A meatball sub with melted provolone and chicken noodle soup for me," Chuck said, taking the items out of the paper bag as he named them, "and a grilled ham sandwich with tomatoes, cheddar, and lettuce and mac and cheese for you."

Gabriel's mouth watered at the delicious smells assaulting his nose, and he eagerly dove into his food.

"So, I was thinking," Gabriel said a few minutes later, mouth full of macaroni. "I'm learning about all the creepy crawlies that exist, and that's helpful, I guess, but what do I do if I ever encounter one of them?"

Chuck paused with a mouthful of soup halfway to his mouth and narrowed his eyes.

"Are you… are you asking me to train you to be a hunter?" he asked.

"Not to be a hunter. Just how to defend myself." Gabriel leaned forward, careful not to let the drawstrings of his jacket fall into his food. "I just want to be prepared in case something actually does happen."

Much to Gabriel's surprise, Chuck actually seemed to be considering it. He sat back in his chair and chewed thoughtfully on a piece of cold cheese.

"Okay," he said.

Gabriel blinked. "Okay?"

"Okay. You're right, you need to be able to protect yourself. Knowing how to kill the… creepy crawlies isn't gonna help you if you aren't actually able to kill them."

"Okay. Wow, I didn't think you'd actually agree. So…"

"So, now, we have a lot more stuff we need to do, huh? I don't think I'll be able to go on another hunt for a while."

Gabriel couldn't fully hide his smile.

* * *

About a month later, Gabriel was sort of wishing that he'd never been so stubborn about finding out what Chuck's job was. Chuck had set up a rigorous training schedule for him that he hated with a passion, but he couldn't deny that he was pleased with the results.

His endurance and stamina were a lot better from running a mile every day (two a day on the weekends), his upper body and core were stronger from the push-ups, sit-ups, and pull-ups that he had to do for half an hour straight every day, and he was pretty confident in his ability to kill one of his classmates if the need arose thanks to Chuck's hand-to-hand combat lessons.

Those were probably Gabriel's least favourite parts of the training. Chuck, despite being almost seventeen years older than Gabriel, had proved himself to be much more agile and a lot stronger, too, than Gabriel. At first.

Now, Gabriel could hold his own pretty well against his father, and had even managed to win a few of their spar sessions. But even alongside the physical aspect of his training, there was the entire contents of the binder - which Gabriel had dubbed the Anti-Bullshit Guide - that he had to memorize, and the pop quizzes about it that Chuck would spring on him. And even besides that, he had to keep up with his regular schoolwork.

His grades had slipped from mostly As and a few Bs to mostly Bs with a few As and even a C or two. Chuck, thankfully, understood that it was tough as shit to juggle all of that at once, and didn't nag him about keeping his grades up. His teachers were a little suspicious, and had asked him more than once if he'd managed to fall in with a "bad crowd", but Gabriel always reassured them that no, he was not hanging with the druggies, yes, he knew that school was very important, and no, he did not need a tutor.

Castiel had offered to tutor him on more than one occasion, as had Sam, and Dean just found the whole situation hilarious (even though Dean had Bs and Cs in every class except math, engineering, and chemistry). Gabriel was extremely grateful that he even still had friends. He'd been so busy that he hadn't been able to hang out outside of school at all in the past month.

Strangely enough, despite the fact that he could only see Castiel and the Winchesters during school, he'd gotten closer to both Sam and Dean. He knew that he and the older Winchester would never be best friends - they bickered too much and were too similar for that - but there was a sort of camaraderie to their arguments and prank wars.

Sam, though, was a different story. He and Sam got along so well that it kind of freaked him out sometimes. Sam was never mad that he was never available to go out to a movie or just hang out, and he didn't ask questions about it like Castiel and Dean did. He was almost as close to Sam as he was to Castiel.

And all of that did absolutely _nothing_ to help his attraction to the moose.

He'd figured, at first, that this crush would go away, but it seemed to have developed into something more akin to love. And he knew it was love, even if it was new and barely there. He felt it in the way his heart fluttered every time Sam touched him, in the way he wanted to spend every second of every day with the moose, in the way that he knew - without a doubt - that he'd kill to keep Sam happy. It wasn't like the love he felt for Castiel, but it was just as potent.

The depth of his emotion scared him sometimes. He'd only known the dude for a month and a half, so how could he feel so strongly about him? But he'd always been the type to fall quickly, he knew. He guessed that the part that scared him was that he'd never fallen this hard before.

He wanted to ask Sam out. Like, on a _date_ date, not just the hanging out after school that they used to do. He thought that Sam was interested in him, too, but he wouldn't be able to tell for sure unless he outright asked Sam, which he absolutely refused to do, because this was not third grade, thank you very much.

In fact, Chuck had given him a day off one Saturday, and Gabriel planned to make the most of it and ask Sam if he wanted to go see a movie. That Friday after school, he, Cas, and the Winchesters were walking towards the parking lot together. Gabriel planned to ask Sam while Dean and Castiel were doing their weird eye-fucking thing like they did every time one of them left the other's presence.

But before he got the chance, his phone rang. An unfamiliar number flashed across the screen and Gabriel walked a few feet away from the group to answer it.

"Hello?" he said.

"Is this Gabriel Shurley?" asked a voice that Gabriel had never heard before. Or, if he had, he didn't remember it.

"Yeah. Who is this?"

"My name's Becky. Your father told me to call you if there was ever an emergency, and I don't think this is what he meant, but I think it counts."

"What? What's wrong?"

Becky clicked her tongue. "What's wrong is there's people about an hour away from where you live being murdered every time they use the bathroom in the public library. I'm pretty sure it's a ghost. I found an article about some woman's death, and it matches what's happening to the victims."

"Okay? What does this have to do with me?" Gabriel asked. "I'm not a hunter."

"You're a hunter's kid," Becky said. "And Chuck said he's been training you, which is good enough for me. I need you to take care of this."

"Are you crazy?" Gabriel hissed. "I can't kill a ghost! I've never even seen anything supernatural."

"Gabriel, people are dying," Becky said, a pleading tone creeping into her voice. "Chuck refused the job, and I can only spare one other hunter."

"Then why don't you send them?" Gabriel asked.

Becky snorted. "You never hunt alone. It's the first rule of hunting. That's how you get killed or turned into something freaky. Look, you'll have an experienced partner with you. You don't even need to bring your own stuff, she'll have everything you need. Please, Gabriel. You can help save lives."

Gabriel closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose.

"Fine," he sighed. "When and where should I meet her?"

"I'll send you the address," Becky said, sounding way too smug. "And you should leave sometime in the next hour or two. She's already there and waiting for you. Bring an overnight bag, just in case. Thanks, and good luck!"

And then the crazy bat hung up. Gabriel stared at his phone in disbelief.

"Everything alright?" Sam asked when he walked back over to Cas' car.

"Fine," Gabriel said. "Just some family stuff that I'm gonna have to take care of."

He looked up at Sam and felt regret lick at his gut. He'd really wanted to ask the stupid moose out. Oh, well. There was always next week, if he survived his first hunt. Joy.

"Okay," Sam said. "Well, I'll see you soon."

"Bye," Gabriel said morosely. He watched as Sam climbed into the front seat of the Impala and then the sleek black car drove off. Castiel raised an eyebrow.

"Care to explain why you're sulking?" he asked.

"I am not sulking." Gabriel got into the car and crossed his arms. Then he realized what he was doing and he scowled.

"Sure you're not," Castiel said sarcastically. "But something's definitely up with you."

"Yeah, I just… I'm gonna tell my dad that I'm sleeping over at your house tonight, okay? Can you tell him that in case he calls?"

" _Are_ you sleeping at my house tonight?" Castiel asked.

"No," Gabriel said. "I have things I need to take care of."

They stopped at a red light and Castiel turned to face Gabriel fully.

"Are you okay?" he asked. "You aren't in any kind of trouble, are you?"

"What? No!" Gabriel said, frowning. "I have to help a friend out with something, that's all."

"Which friend?"

"You don't know her, but her name's Becky." Gabriel sighed at Cas' disapproving yet concerned look. "I'll be fine, Castiel, so stop worrying. And don't blow my cover. Please?"

"Dork," Cas said fondly as the light turned green and he accelerated. "You're not going undercover."

And that was the closest thing to permission from Castiel that Gabriel would ever get.

* * *

An hour and a half later, Gabriel walked through the door of a tiny, dingy, stain-filled motel room with his overnight bag on his shoulder. There was a woman there, just like Becky said there would be, and she looked up from the gun she was wiping down.

She looked to be a little older than Chuck, with crows feet and lines on her forehead that Gabriel guessed were from stress. Her eyes were sharp above her hooked nose, and a dark brown that complimented her olive complexion and long, brown hair. When she stood, she was just a few inches taller than Gabriel.

"You Gabriel?" she asked. Gabriel nodded and set his bag down on the unoccupied bed. "You're younger than Becky said you'd be." Gabriel shrugged, and the woman frowned. "Is this your first hunt?"

Gabriel nodded again, not really in the mood to talk. The hunter - huntress? - didn't seem to care. She tossed him a shotgun and a box of iron rounds. Gabriel remembered from the Anti-Bullshit Guide that iron was pretty useful against ghosts, even if it wouldn't kill them. He loaded the gun and shoved a few extra rounds in his pocket.

"Alright, listen up," said the woman. "The name's Sharon. I'm only letting you come because I need a partner and we need to get rid of this thing ASAP. You are not in charge in this outfit. I am. You do whatever I say, when I say it, and you do not question me, understand? I am not your babysitter. It's not my job to make sure you make it home safe to mommy. My job is to kill monsters. Now, you ready?"

Gabriel was scowling at her little speech - that jab about his mother stung a little - but he clenched his jaw and nodded.

"Good. Let's go."


	6. Chapter 6

At almost midnight on Saturday, Gabriel snuck back into his house via the tree. He threw his overnight bag next to his bed and headed for the bathroom, intent on taking a shower since he hadn't had the chance to since Friday morning.

He thought that the hunt had gone well, especially considering that it was his first one. On Friday night, he and Sharon had gone to the library to check out the situation. They'd encountered the ghost, Gabriel had gotten thrown into a wall, and then they'd gone back to their motel room to plan. It had been uncomfortable for him, sleeping in the same room as a complete stranger, but he hadn't gotten murdered in his sleep, so he counted it as a win.

Saturday was spent locating the ghost's grave. Becky could only get so much information over the phone, so they'd had to pose as reporters in order to interview the woman's daughter. After it got dark, Gabriel went to the local cemetery to salt and burn the ghost's body while Sharon broke into the library to distract her.

It hadn't really worked, though, and the ghost showed up at the grave site, thrown Gabriel into a headstone, and then tried to kill him. It was only dumb luck that had allowed him to toss his lighter into the grave, and then he had gotten the hell out of there without even watching what he was sure had been a pretty awesome light show.

Sharon had insisted that he stay overnight with her at the motel room, but Gabriel hadn't wanted to give Chuck reason to be suspicious, so he'd driven an hour back home, even though all he wanted to do was sleep.

Once he got to the bathroom, he made sure that the door was closed all the way before stripping himself and stepping into the warm spray. His back hurt with a dull ache that let him know that he had some pretty gnarly bone bruises. Most likely from getting thrown around like a rag doll. Stupid ghost.

He stayed in the shower as long as he dared, and then he stepped out in front of the mirror to survey the damage done to his body. As he'd suspected, his upper back and shoulder blades were a mess of tender purple skin. They kind of looked cool as a background for those weird markings on his right side that still hadn't gone away, but they hurt like a motherfucker.

He flicked off the light and padded back to his room, and slipped naked under the covers of his bed after locking his door and window. His sleep was, thankfully, dreamless that night.

* * *

A loud banging noise woke him up the next morning, and it took him a few moments to wake up enough for his brain to recognize that the banging was actually Chuck knocking on his door.

"I'm up!" he called, voice cracking as he yawned halfway through the last word. His phone let him know that it was eight thirty in the morning. That was when he usually woke up on weekends for his daily run, but now he wanted nothing more than to go back to sleep and not wake up until he stopped hurting.

"Gabriel, come on," Chuck said, voice muffled by the door. "I already let you sleep in half an hour, and I can't let you slack off too much. You can go back to sleep after your run."

Groaning loud enough that Chuck could hear him, Gabriel pulled himself out of his warm bed and over to his dresser. He pulled on boxers, basketball shorts, and a loose white t-shirt and then grabbed his phone and earbuds. Chuck was waiting for him by the front door with two water bottles in his hand.

"Ready?" he asked.

"In a minute," Gabriel replied. He snatched a granola bar from the counter and ate it in two quick bites, then joined his father. "Now I'm ready."

Chuck set a pretty fast pace, and Gabriel struggled a little more than he normally did. Whereas he could normally do a six and a half minute mile, he got almost eight minutes this time. His back was killing him, and swinging his arms only made it worse. Chuck cast him worried and slightly suspicious glances the entire time, and by the time they got back to the house, he had figured out that something was up.

"What the hell was that?" he panted as he walked into the kitchen. He threw his empty water bottle into the recycling bin, grabbed a new one from the fridge, and downed half of it before speaking again. "That was terrible compared to your usual times."

Gabriel leaned against the doorframe and squeezed his eyes shut, trying not to let any of his pain show. It really, really, _really_ hurt, but he knew that Chuck would be livid if he found out Gabriel had gone on a hunt and gotten hurt. But he'd never been a very good actor, and when he opened his eyes again, Chuck was right in front of him, searching his face for something.

"What happened?" he asked, eyes narrowing. "I know something happened."

"Nothing happened," Gabriel said. "I just… fell and bruised my back, that's all."

"Let me see," Chuck demanded. Gabriel froze. _The marks._ How was he supposed to explain them? Chuck would know that they weren't normal tattoos, that they were something obviously supernatural, but Gabriel had no idea how the man would react. He turned around so that Chuck wouldn't see him biting his lip. Slowly - mostly to stall, but also because _ow_ \- he grabbed the edge of his shirt and started to pull it off.

Chuck's phone rang.

Oh, _thank God._

Chuck frowned, but left to answer it, and Gabriel almost ran up the stairs. Almost. Because, again, _ow._

He grabbed his laptop and locked himself in his room, then looked up ways to speed up the healing of bruises. Ice, elevate, apply heat, Google told him. Gabriel frowned. To get ice, he'd have to go downstairs. Where Chuck was.

...Maybe a cold shower would work.

He closed his laptop and found a relatively clean smelling towel in his closet, then he crept towards the bathroom. He turned the knob in the tub all the way to cold, then shed his clothes and braced himself.

The water was colder than he'd anticipated, and he almost jumped out, but then his extremities started to go numb, and he was more or less fine. His body had always produced just a little bit more heat than was normal, especially for someone of his size, and so he managed to stay under the spray for longer than he'd thought he would be able to.

His back was pleasantly numb when he finally stepped out and dried himself off, and he threw his sweat-soaked clothes into his hamper and pulled on a pair of (warm) sweatpants and a hoodie. He hadn't heard anything from Chuck in the last fifteen or so minutes, so he thought it safe to go back downstairs and get some breakfast.

He was so, so wrong.

"Hello, Gabriel," came a voice to his right when he walked downstairs, and Gabriel turned and found Chuck sitting on the couch, a deadly calm expression on his face and murder in his eyes.

Gabriel gulped.

"Hey," Gabriel wheedled. "What's up, Dad?"

"Did you know," Chuck started, "that I know a woman named Becky? Well, of course you do, because apparently, you've started working for her and going out on hunts with some crackhead hunter named Sharon!" Chuck was yelling at this point, and Gabriel flinched at the tone. "I taught you how to be a hunter so that you'd be able to defend yourself, not so you'd go out and actively try to kill yourself!"

"In my defense, Becky can be very persuasive," Gabriel said. "She guilt-tripped me, man."

"Don't 'man' me," Chuck snarled. "And trust me, I have had _words_ with her. But you should've known better. I mean, how stupid can you be?"

"Hey!" Gabriel protested.

"Is this why you were falling behind in your mile today?" Chuck demanded. "Are you hurt?"

"It's just a few bruises," Gabriel said. "Nothing serious."

"Let me see," Chuck said, and Gabriel's eyes widened.

"I'd really rather not," he said. Chuck eyed him suspiciously, but didn't press. He seemed to deflate suddenly, and sank back against the couch.

"At least you're okay," he said softly.

"Yeah, well, it was only a ghost," Gabriel told him.

Very slowly, Chuck's hand reached up and started massaging his temples.

"I have a headache," he said. "I'm going back to bed. Goodnight."

"It's nine in the morning," Gabriel pointed out.

"Goodnight!"

"Does this mean I have the rest of the day off?" Gabriel asked. Chuck flapped a hand at him without looking as he walked up the stairs, and Gabriel texted Sam to see if he wanted to hang out. And then, because he had apparently adopted a 'what's the worse that could happen?' attitude after almost dying at the hands of a murderous ghost, he added one last question.

 **Gabriel: hey, Sam. wanna go do something if you're not busy?**

 **Gabriel: as, like, a date?**

It was only after he had hit send that he'd realized what he'd done, but by then it was too late to take it back. For a few minutes, nothing happened. And then the icon that meant Sam was typing appeared.

 **Sam: sorry no im straight**

If Gabriel was in his right mind, he'd have noticed that Sam hadn't texted with the impeccable grammar and punctuation that he always used. As it was, Gabriel was just a little too preoccupied to bother with such things.

As soon as he'd read that first word, his heart had nearly stopped. His chest constricted painfully, and his breath came in harsh pants, indicative of a sob building up. He seemed to be in physical pain, and he was just coherent enough to realize that this was not normal.

He hadn't even been this upset when his grandparents had died, and he knew for a fact that he could handle rejection, so why did this hurt so much? Apparently, he'd cared more about this than he'd thought.

Turning off his phone, he managed to stumble to his feet and then to the stairs. The tears finally spilled over, making it nearly impossible to see as he made his way to his room. What little he'd eaten that morning was threatening to make a reappearance, and he clapped a hand over his mouth and took a few deep breaths.

"Gabriel?" Chuck called from his room. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," Gabriel lied, voice thick. "Just not feeling very well."

Chuck, thankfully, left him alone, and Gabriel closed and locked the door of his room. He shoved a towel into the crack between the door and the floor, then flopped face first onto his bed. And only then did he release the hurt that had building up within him. He pressed his face into his pillow to muffle his sobs and hoped to god that Chuck wouldn't somehow hear him. The last thing he needed was to explain why he was crying in his bed over something as small as a rejection.

But rationality took a backseat to his emotions, and he thought of nothing except for how much he wanted Sam.

His shoulders shook hard, but the pillow muffled the noise, thankfully. For what seemed like hours, but could only have been one, he cried. The amount of tears he could even shed at one time surprised him.

Eventually, the tears dried up and he was left a hiccuping, puffy-eyed, red-cheeked mess. He tried to calm his breathing, to ignore the pain in his chest, and it must have worked, because he fell into a fitful doze.

He was visited by another dream while he was asleep. Unlike the others, which left him feeling happy and safe, this one was full of fear and despair. He saw Sam again, but this time he actually spoke to Gabriel.

"I don't want you," he spat, eyes burning with hate, and Gabriel woke with fresh tears streaming down his face. The clock on his bedside table told him that it was nearly nine o'clock at night. He'd slept the entire day away.

He should probably get up and eat something.

He went back to sleep.

* * *

He didn't dream that night, thankfully, but the next morning he woke up feeling worse than he had before. Chuck came by around six and knocked on his door softly.

"Gabriel, you okay?" he asked, voice muffled through the door. "You need to get up if you're gonna make it to school on time."

"'M not going," Gabriel mumbled. "Don't feel well."

There was a pause. "Okay," Chuck said. "Let me know if you need anything, alright?"

Gabriel didn't reply. He laid in his bed and closed his eyes, but unfortunately, sleep wouldn't come. His stomach was growling insistently at him, hunger gnawing at his insides and making him clutch weakly at his stomach, but he didn't want to get up and go search for food.

No, that wasn't true. He wanted to eat, he really did, but he just couldn't find the motivation to get out of bed. So he laid there, staring at the ceiling, the wall, the clock, all the while thinking of Sam. Of how Sam looked when he was concentrating, smiling, laughing; of his stupid adorable dimple and his stupidly kissable lips; of his stupid silky hair and his stupid hazel eyes that couldn't decide on a colour.

But thinking of Sam made his chest ache even worse than his stomach was, and so he thought of other things. Of how pathetic he was, lying in his bed like a depressed twelve-year-old girl pining after their favourite movie star. Of how abnormal this was for him. Of how special Sam must be to have initiated this kind of reaction in him.

The day dragged by and around seven, Chuck came back and knocked on his door again.

"Hey, since you haven't eaten all day, I brought you dinner," he said. Gabriel perked up slightly at the mention of food, but he still couldn't muster the energy to get up and unlock his door. He didn't have to worry about it, though, because a few moments later, something was inserted into the lock and then the door swung open.

"I knew that key would come in handy one day," Chuck said as he walked into the room. He was carrying a tray in one hand and a small golden key in the other, but he put both down on Gabriel's desk when he saw Gabriel lying near comatose in his bed. "Hey, are you okay?"

Gabriel whined low in his throat and turned his face into his pillow, curling into a ball underneath his blankets. The last thing he wanted right now was for Chuck to see him like this and interrogate him. But Chuck surprised him, sitting on the edge of his bed and placing the back of his hand against Gabriel's neck, and Gabriel remembered that he'd told Chuck that he wasn't feeling well. Well, that explained why he'd let Gabriel ditch school.

"You're a little hot," Chuck murmured, and Gabriel frowned a little in confusion. He wasn't actually sick. Was he? "Here, eat and then go to sleep. We'll see how you feel in the morning and then go from there, okay?"

"Okay," Gabriel mumbled, voice scratchy from disuse. Chuck gave him a small smile as he walked out, closing the door behind him. For a few minutes, Gabriel didn't move. But then the smell of whatever Chuck had brought him (spaghetti and meatballs in marinara sauce, if his nose could be trusted) made it over to his bed and his stomach growled in anticipation.

He pulled himself out of bed, pausing to steady himself when he swayed a little, then made his way over to his desk. He was right about what Chuck had brought him, and he took a small bite. His appetite flared to life after that and he eagerly dug into his meal, draining almost an entire water bottle after he'd finished most of the pasta.

And while he was feeling motivated to take care of himself, he decided to change his clothes. He shucked what he was wearing and pulled on his favourite pair of pajama pants and his softest, oldest t-shirt. Looking at the door, he briefly debated on going out and taking a shower, or at least making it downstairs, but decided against it.

The constant ache in his chest hadn't gone away yet, though it wasn't that painful if he didn't think of Sam. He was surprised that he'd even been able to get up, eat, and change, honestly, because his mind was a dark, dark place just then, full of self-loathing thoughts and pain and despair.

He knew, rationally, that it wasn't his fault Sam had rejected him. He'd said he was straight, after all, but still Gabriel's mind was full of questions.

Not wanting to be alone with his thoughts, Gabriel flopped back down onto his bed and grabbed his phone from his bedside table. As soon as he turned it back on, he was bombarded with notifications. Most of them were texts and calls from Castiel, but there was one from Sam asking if he was okay.

He couldn't help the tears that welled in his eyes at that. Sam still cared about him enough to check on him, even after Gabriel had (maybe) ruined their friendship by asking him out. His fingers hovered over the keyboard, ready to type out a message, but he knew that if he did he'd end up confessing his love to Sam, and that would only make things even more awkward between them.

Instead, he called Castiel. The phone only rang once before it was picked up, and then Castiel's angry voice came on over the line.

"Where have you been?" he demanded. "I've called and texted you so many times today! You could have at least told me you were gonna ditch. There had better be a damn good reason for making me freak out like that."

"It's nice to hear your voice, too, Cas," Gabriel said sarcastically, rolling his eyes even though Castiel wouldn't be able to see him. He hadn't realized how much he'd missed his friend. "And I wish I could tell you there was a good reason why I ditched, but there's not. I'm just…"

"You sound sad," Castiel said softly. "Gabriel, what happened?"

"I… I asked Sam out. Over text," Gabriel said. He heard Castiel inhale sharply.

"And what happened?" he asked. "Wait, never mind. If he had said yes, you would have told me. He said no, didn't he?"

"Yeah," Gabriel said, voice cracking just the slightest bit. He cleared his throat before continuing. "He's straight, apparently. I just didn't want to make things awkward by coming to school today."

"Bullshit," Castiel spat.

"What?"

"Sam is not straight. I've seen the way he acts around you, how he looks at you. He returns your feelings, I know he does. Maybe they're not as strong, but they're there."

"But why would he reject me, then?" Gabriel hated how his voice got small and quiet.

"Because he's an asshole," Castiel said, and Gabriel felt his temper flare, irrational though it was. He had to actually bite his tongue to keep from leaping to Sam's defense. "How are you holding up?"

"I'm dealing," Gabriel lied. "Did I miss anything important today?"

"Not really. We have a quiz next week in math, but that's about it."

"Ugh. Gross. Thanks, Cas."

"You're welcome. Text me if you aren't coming to school tomorrow, okay?"

"I will," Gabriel promised, and then he hung up. He laid back and closed his eyes and tried not to think of Sam. Instead, he focused on how out of shape he was going to be whenever he got out of this funk. It didn't make the ache go away fully, but it helped keep his thoughts away from dangerous subjects.


	7. Chapter 7

The next few days were much harder than that first one had been. He rarely got out of bed and didn't eat unless Chuck brought him food. He spent most of his time lying listlessly in bed, sleeping, and even crying a few more times when Sam texted him, asking him if he was okay.

By the time Friday rolled around, Chuck was worried enough that he was seriously considering taking Gabriel to a hospital. The only reason he hadn't yet was because Gabriel pleaded with him not to.

Castiel was extremely pissed. He blamed Sam completely for Gabriel's sudden depression, and it was only Gabriel that prevented him from completely going ape shit on the Winchester. He'd already become snappy and irritable with Sam, and both Sam and Dean had texted Gabriel asking about Castiel's sudden anger with the younger of the two.

That Friday, about a week after Sam rejected Gabriel, Becky called with a hunt for Chuck. The man was, understandably, very reluctant to leave Gabriel alone, but Becky was adamant. There was something killing children a few hours away from where they lived, and local authorities were stumped.

"Chuck, you're the only hunter in your area who's picking up their phone," Becky had told him. "If there was another option, I'd go with them."

He eventually decided to go, but only on the condition that Gabriel called him if something happened. He was gone by the time lunch rolled around, not that Gabriel noticed. He hadn't even gotten out of bed that day, and didn't plan on doing so anytime soon.

Castiel called him once that day. Gabriel didn't answer.

* * *

Around five o'clock that Saturday, Gabriel got another phone call. He didn't answer it. But then he got another, and another, and another. After the fifteenth call, he was annoyed enough that he managed to pull himself out of bed and over to where his phone was sitting on his dresser.

"What?" he snarled into it when he picked up. His voice sounded scratchy and rough from dissuse, and there was a pause from the person on the other side of the line.

"Are you having sex?" Becky asked. "Why is your voice so husky?"

"It is not husky," Gabriel said, clearing his throat. "What do you want, Becky? Wait, did something happen to Dad?"

"No, no, Chuck is fine," Becky said. "I actually called to talk to you."

"Why?"

"I have another hunt for you."

"Are you serious?" Gabriel asked. "My back is still bruised from the last hunt you sent me on."

"Oh, come on, a few bruises never hurt anyone," Becky said dismissively. "Besides, this is an easy hunt. A vampire was spotted crossing into your state a few days ago, and I just got a call about missing pets in a neighborhood not even fifteen minutes from where you live."

"Do you have proof that it was actually a vampire?" Gabriel asked. "And pets go missing all the time."

"Yeah, but they're not usually found a day or two later with their throats torn out and their bodies drained of blood."

"Ugh. Okay, fine, so there's a vampire in town. So what? It doesn't sound like it's going after people."

Becky sighed exasperatedly. "Yes, but how long until it starts attacking the children wandering around trying to find their lost pets?" she asked. "Like I told Chuck yesterday, there's no other hunters anywhere near you guys. You're the only one who can handle this."

Gabriel closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. He had a headache, and this was not helping.

"Please?" Becky wheedled. "Think of the kids."

"Fine! I'll do it if you'll shut up," Gabriel growled. "Text me the details and I'll be ready to go in an hour or two."

"An hour or two is too long! Can't you go now?"

"No."

He hung up and tossed his phone onto his bed. His head fell into his hands and he ran his fingers through his hair, grimacing at how greasy it felt. He seriously needed to shower. In fact, that was the first thing he was going to do before his hunt.

He grabbed his black military-style cargo pants and a black tee, then walked to his bathroom. He swayed enough that he had to hold onto the wall for support, and he decided that food would be his second priority.

Vampires had an excellent sense of smell, and would definitely be able to smell soap and shampoo from a mile away, so he just did his best to scrub himself clean with only the water streaming from the showerhead. He stayed under the spray for twenty minutes or so, and then he dried himself off, put on his clean clothes, and headed downstairs to find some food.

He hadn't eaten since before Chuck left the previous day, and he hadn't been eating well to begin with, so his apetite was smaller than it had been before. If he tried to eat real food, he knew he wouldn't be able to keep it down, so he raided Chuck's stash of protein bars and downed a bottle of Gatorade.

He grabbed a few more bars and an extra bottle to bring with him, and he stuffed them into one of the large pockets in his pants. Chuck had an extra stash of weapons in the house somewhere, Gabriel knew, and after half an hour of searching, he finally found it hidden in the back of the hall closet. He pulled on his combat boots, grabbed a machete, his phone, and the Anti-Bullshit Guide from its spot on the kitchen counter, and headed out to his car.

He had one very important stop he had to make before he left, because he was breaking the first rule of hunting and there was no telling what would happen to him against something as strong as a vampire. He was going on what was essentially a suicide mission, trying to fight a vampire on his own in his weakened state. There was a high probability that he was going to die, and strangely enough, he was okay with that.

He still wasn't over Sam's rejection. In fact, instead of lessening over time, the pain was only getting stronger. It should have scared him, the fact that he'd rather die than live in a world in which Sam was not his, but it felt… right somehow. He didn't dwell on it. He'd arrived at his destination.

Castiel's house looked exactly the same as it had the last time he'd been there, but instead of beeping the horn until someone came outside, he texted Castiel. Not even two minutes later, Castiel practically broke down his front door in his haste to get outside.

"You are an asshole and I hope you fall down a flight of stairs," was the first thing he said when he slipped into the passenger seat. Then he frowned and gave Gabriel a concerned look that quickly morphed to anger. "You look like shit. I am going to kill that Winchester."

"No, Cas, wait." Gabriel turned off his car and turned so that he was facing Castiel directly. "Forget about Sam for a minute. I have something I need to tell you. Well, a lot of somethings, actually."

"Is everything okay?" Castiel asked. Gabriel smirked.

"Nothing will ever be okay ever again, actually," he said. "What I'm about to tell you might ruin your life."

"If it's important to you, then I want to know." God, what did Gabriel do to deserve a friend like Castiel?

He took a deep breath and let it out slow. "So, I found out what my dad's job is."

* * *

An hour or so later, Gabriel was finally done explaining things and answering questions, and Castiel was trying to absorb everything.

"So, then," he finally said, "what are those marks on your back? Are those…?"

"I have no idea," Gabriel said. "But they aren't hurting me and they look badass, so I'm gonna leave them be."

"Gabriel, why did you tell me all this?" Castiel finally asked.

"I just needed to tell someone," Gabriel said. "I've been keeping this secret for, like, two months almost, and it was getting to be a lot. Oh, and here." He reached down and pulled the Anti-Bullshit Guide out from the space at his feet. "This is… I think it's called 'Chuck's Guide To Not Getting Killed By Supernatural Bullshit', but I call it the Anti-Bullshit Guide. It contains everything Chuck knows about everything."

"You're giving it to me?"

"No, idiot. I just want you to read it, make copies of it, something. Be prepared. There's a vampire roaming around town and I want to make sure that you know how to handle it if I can't take care of it."

"I'm sorry, what? You're going after a vampire?"

"Well, yeah. Chuck trained me to be a hunter, so don't you think that I should actually hunt?"

"What if something happens?" Castiel asked.

"Relax, I'm not going by myself," Gabriel lied. He found himself doing that a lot lately. "I'll have a partner."

It was with great reluctance that Castiel finally left, taking the Anti-Bullshit Guide with him. Gabriel turned his car back on and pulled away from the curb. As he drove, he glanced quickly at his phone. Becky had texted him with an address, and he recognized it as a large park near the center of town. Although, it was less of a park and more of a medium sized wood filled with huge trees and thick underbrush. It was the perfect place for something to hide.

By the time he made it to his destination and parked in the parking lot, he'd drained his extra Gatorade bottle and eaten all three of the protein bars he'd brought. He could practically feel the energy returning to his malnourished limbs, but he knew it was only temporary. If he was going to do this thing, he'd need to hurry.

It was only six thirty, but it was already dark enough that all the streetlights were on. While that would make it harder for him to deal with the vampire, it also meant there would be almost no nosy bystanders coming to investigate, should they hear anything.

After taking a deep breath to mentally prepare himself, he stepped out of his car and strapped the machete to his waist. His phone was put on silent and slipped into one of his pockets, and then he started walking. There was a path that wound its way through the woods, but that would leave him too exposed, so he struck out into the underbrush as quietly as he could in search of the vampire.

Now that he was actually doing this, he realized just how stupid this plan - if it could even be called a plan - truly was. There was no way that he'd be able to just stumble upon the vampire while wandering around the woods without getting killed first and oh, look, there was the vampire.

Gabriel had only been walking for not even two minutes. He could still see his car through the trees behind him, and yet he'd already found what he was hunting. Well, then. Somebody upstairs must really want him to complete this hunt. Or to die on it. Either way, Gabriel wasn't going to question it.

The vamp was stalking a woman and her dog who were walking along the path. Gabriel could see the moonlight glinting off of his fangs, and he was eyeing the woman with blatant hunger in his features. Slowly and silently, Gabriel creeped up behind him and drew his machete.

Keeping it low, so the light wouldn't reflect off of it and give away his position, he stopped only a few feet from the vampire. He didn't notice him, too busy staring at his prey, but then the wind changed direction and blew Gabriel's scent right to him. The vampire froze and spun around, growling, but the machete was already slicing through the air and connecting with his neck before he could do anything.

But the sword didn't completely decapitate him. Gabriel couldn't put enough strength between the swing to slice all the way through the neck, and the sword embedded itself into the vampire's neck, which only seemed to piss him off. He snarled loudly and wrenched the sword free from his neck, scattering blood droplets everywhere. Gabriel kept his mouth firmly closed and tried to think of a plan.

He was weaponless, alone, and in no condition to fight off the vampire… but maybe he didn't have to. The machete hadn't gone all the way through, but the vampire's neck was bleeding a lot. If he could just get his hands on something sharp enough to cut through the rest of the muscle and skin…

The vampire lunged at him, teeth bared, and Gabriel stumbled backwards. He tripped over a root and went down hard, and the vampire followed him. Gabriel just barely managed to twist out of the way, and he scrambled to his feet and looked around wildly for his machete. The vampire smirked at him and let out an evil chuckle.

"You shouldn't have done that," he sing-songed, voice distorted slightly by his huge fangs. Gabriel sneered at him defiantly and leaned into the tree at his back. The vampire walked up to him cockily, confident in his victory, and Gabriel tensed.

He'd thought, before, that he'd be fine with dying. But now that he was actually faced with death, he realized that he really, really wanted to live. Maybe he couldn't have what he wanted with Sam, and that was fine. He'd take what he could get with the moose. If that meant only friendship, then so be it. But it would be really hard to do that if he was dead.

Desperation flooded through him, as did a new will to survive. This time, when the vampire darted towards him, he sidestepped and locked one arm around the vamp's head. The other arm snaked around his neck, and he jumped up and wrapped his legs around the creature's waist. Using the last of his strength, he pulled. The vampire screamed in pain and anger, thrashing around wildly, but Gabriel gritted his teeth and hung on.

Finally, there was a huge wet slurping sound and the head popped free of the vampire's neck. The body dropped immediately, with Gabriel still wrapped around it. Panting, Gabriel pulled himself to his feet and grimaced at the feeling of the warm blood coating his clothes and seeping through them to his skin.

He found his machete in a bush a few feet away, and he carefully inserted it back into its sheath after wiping it off on a relatively clean part of his shirt. He was exhausted, and he leaned had to lean on a tree as he waited for his heart to stop pounding.

After a few minutes, he felt he was calm enough to start walking back to his car. But as he turned towards the parking lot, there was a rustling sound behind him, and he froze and turned to face it.

From the trees stepped a man and a woman, and they looked shocked. Their wide eyes flickered from his blood-stained clothes to the sword hanging at his hip to the head sitting on the ground at his feet. For a moment, none of them moved.

Then, Gabriel laughed nervously and said, "This isn't what it looks like. You don't happen to believe in vampires, do you?"

The two people opposite him narrowed their eyes and bared their teeth, and Gabriel's heart rate sped up again as sharp fangs descended from their gums.

"Well, shit, I guess you do," he said, eyes wide.

Becky had said there was only one vampire, so what the hell were these two doing here? But wait, hadn't the Anti-Bullshit Guide said that vamps always travel in groups? And he had been stupid enough to trust Becky instead of consulting the book his father had made. He was usually so careful to not make stupid mistakes, and it looked like this one was going to get him killed, because there was no way he was going to be able to handle two vampires on his own.

"You killed Derek," the woman growled, stepping forward threateningly. Gabriel took one step back and put his hand on the hilt of his machete, though he knew it wasn't going to help.

"Yeah, sorry about that," Gabriel said nervously. "I had no idea he had… family?"

The two vampires both snarled simultaneously and Gabriel didn't stick around to see what they were going to do. He turned tail and ran as fast as he could away from the threat. Belatedly, he realized that he was running deeper into the woods, away from the path and his car.

The vampires were gaining on him. He hadn't even been running for five minutes minutes, but he was already slowing down, unable to keep up the pace the vampires were forcing him to run at. He risked a glance behind him and wished that he hadn't.

The male vampire was right behind him, teeth bared and eyes flashing. Gabriel yelped when the man plowed into his back, sending him to the ground and pinning him down easily. The vamp didn't waste any time in biting him, and Gabriel screamed when he felt sharp teeth pierce the flesh of his shoulder.

His survival instincts flared up even stronger than before and he began to thrash around, trying to dislodge the vampire from his back. But then a boot stepped into his view and Gabriel looked up as best as he could to find the woman standing above him, her eyes filled with hunger. She crouched down next to him and Gabriel knew that he wouldn't be able to free himself on his own.

 _Helphelphelphelphelphelphelphelphelp!_

The teeth retracted and two mouths latched onto his skin. He could feel them sucking the blood from him and his struggles grew weaker and weaker. Black spots danced across the edges of his vision, growing steadily larger as more and more of his blood was drained.

Okay, so. He was going to die apparently. He'd heard that when people died, sometimes they saw things. He knew a guy who knew a guy who had a cousin who'd almost drowned last year, and just before she'd passed out, she claimed that she'd seen a giant butterfly swimming around in the pool with her, wearing a red sweater.

Gabriel had been skeptical at first, of course, but he was currently being sucked dry by two vampires, so he didn't really have any right to discredit something for sounding fake.

He wondered what his hallucination would be. Maybe it would be Sam. That would be nice, he thought, to see Sam one more time before he died.

But it wasn't Sam that came into his line of sight just then. Gabriel was pretty sure it was a wolf, actually. A really, really _big_ wolf. It ripped one of the vampires off of Gabriel just as his eyes closed.

He didn't open them again.


	8. Chapter 8

Until he did.

It was an annoying beeping noise that eventually broke through his unconsciousness and woke him up, and his mind struggled to place where he'd heard it before.

Ah, right. That was what the heart monitors in hospital shows sounded like. He was probably in a hospital, then.

But why?

Wait… vampires. Ugh. He hated vampires. He hoped that wherever those rude shits were, they were being tortured by a baby that wouldn't stop crying or overpriced milk.

Wait... did vampires even drink milk?

Whatever.

His eyelids were heavy when he tried to open them, and it took him a few tries to get his body to respond to his commands. Luckily, the room was dark, so it didn't take long for his eyes to adjust.

His earlier assessment had been correct; he was in a hospital. His room was small, but he was the only occupant. Blinds covered the large windows that took up almost an entire wall, and across from them was the door that presumably led to the hallway. Gabriel's bed was pushed against the wall between the windows and the door, and he was facing another door with the unisex bathroom symbol on it.

He turned his head and noticed that there was a water bottle on the bedside table. Slowly, he pulled himself up into a sitting position and opened the bottle. He drained most of it, and wiped off the few drops that had slid down his chin while he took stock of his injuries.

It was hard to miss the IV attached to his arm. It fed him what he assumed to be nutrients and supplements to combat his malnourishment. He tried not to think about it; needles freaked him out. His head throbbed in time with his heartbeat, and even simply sitting up was making his vision swim slightly, so he figured that he probably had a concussion.

When he reached up to feel his shoulder, his fingers met with thick bandages instead of skin. His entire left shoulder was wrapped up in the stuff, and so was his right forearm. Huh. He hadn't even noticed any injuries there.

When he was satisfied, he looked around the bed to see if he could spot his phone. It wasn't on the bedside table, but he found it in the small drawer that was in the table. There was a tiny crack running down the length of the screen, but it still worked, miraculously. Apparently, he'd only been out for a day. It was nine o'clock at night on Monday.

He thumbed through his contacts until he found the one labelled 'Dog the Bounty Hunter'. Chuck picked up on the second ring, and he sounded a little frantic when he answered.

"Gabriel, are you okay? Did something happen? Did you go to the hospital? Which hospital? Do you need me to come back? I'm leaving now. I'll be home in a few hours. Bye."

Chuck hung up and Gabriel sighed. He loved his father, he really did, but sometimes the man could be so scatterbrained.

He started counting mentally, and he hadn't even gotten to five before his phone rang again.

"I did the thing again," Chuck said forlornly when Gabriel picked up.

"Yup," Gabriel replied.

"I'm sorry."

"Are you gonna listen this time?"

"Mm hmm."

"Okay, good." Gabriel paused and debated on whether or not to sugar coat what he was about to say. He finally decided not to, because it was just like ripping off a Band-Aid, right? "I'm in the hospital."

There was a crash on the other side of the line, and some muffled cursing. "What happened?" Chuck demanded. "Are you sick? You know what, it doesn't matter. I've already finished the hunt, I'm coming home now. Which hospital are you in?"

"Um, I don't know? I just woke up."

"Okay, well, text me when you find out."

"I will," Gabriel promised before hanging up. He looked around once more and found a remote that looked like it was attached to his bed. One of the buttons was labelled 'Call nurse', and a woman appeared in the doorway not even five minutes after he pushed it. She smiled when she saw him sitting up, and came into the room to stand by the foot of his bed.

"It's about time you woke up," she teased playfully, and it helped to put him at ease a little. He'd never liked hospitals, but it wasn't so bad as long as the staff were friendly. "I was beginning to wonder if you'd have to be moved to the coma ward."

"What happened?" Gabriel asked, interested to hear the theory that the doctors had come up with.

"Well, according to your boyfriend, you decided to go hiking in the woods alone at night and were attacked by something," she said, and Gabriel frowned in confusion. He didn't have a boyfriend. The nurse grabbed a pen and his chart and started checking his vitals, making little notes on the chart as she did. She gave him a very disapproving look that reminded Gabriel of mothers, even though she looked too young to have any kids. "I don't know what you were thinking. If your boyfriend hadn't decided to walk his dog along the path and found you, you probably wouldn't have survived."

"But I don't have a boyfriend," Gabriel told her, and she just quirked an eyebrow at him, which irritated him to no end.

"He said you might say that," she said. She put his chart back and came to rest her hand on his uninjured shoulder. Gabriel was normally a very tactile person, but he couldn't help leaning away from her touch slightly. He realized with a jolt that it was because she was touching his marks. He didn't want anyone to touch them. Well, no one but Sam, for whatever reason…

"Whatever you're fighting about, he told me it was just a misunderstanding born of miscommunication," the nurse said, and Gabriel's confusion skyrocketed. What the hell was she talking about? "He's actually outside in the waiting room. He wouldn't leave until he got to see you. He's been here ever since he brought you in last night." She sighed then, and got a dreamy look in her eye. "It's so romantic."

Oh, lord.

"You can let him in," Gabriel said, jolting her out of whatever stupor she'd gotten herself into. He was very curious about this boyfriend of his. The nurse - her name tag let him know that she was named Emily - promised to get him right away, and she returned not ten minutes after leaving with someone following her.

"Cas!" Gabriel exclaimed. Castiel smiled at him and hurried to his side.

"The doctor will be in to talk to you soon," Emily promised, backing out of the room.

Gabriel thanked her, then turned to his friend.

"It's very good to see you awake," Castiel said. Then his face scrunched up angrily, and he punched Gabriel's shoulder. "If you ever do something that stupid again, I will kill you. Vampires? What were you thinking?"

"Love you, too," Gabriel grumbled sarcastically, rubbing at his arm. "Why did you tell the nurse you were my boyfriend?"

Castiel adopted an irritated expression, and he crossed his arms.

"I didn't," he said.

"Then who…?"

"I did," said someone at the door, and Gabriel turned to find none other than Sam fucking Winchester standing there casually, a tiny smirk on his face.

Well, shit.

"What the fuck. Cas, what the fuck!" Gabriel exclaimed, looking away from Sam with some difficulty and pinning his friend with a glare. "Someone better explain. Now."

"I will, I promise," Sam said, coming over and sitting on the side of his bed. Gabriel's heart did not skip a beat or speed up, thankfully - he was still hooked up to heart monitor, and that would have been unbelievably embarrassing - but his cheeks heated up slightly. Sam must have noticed - Castiel definitely did, judging by the way he was glaring at both Sam and Gabriel - but if he did, he was kind enough to not make any outward signs to show it. "We just have to wait for my father to get here."

"Your father? What the hell does he have to do with anything?" Gabriel asked.

"He has everything to do with this," Sam replied, and that wasn't weird at all. Gabriel stared at him with narrowed eyes, waiting to see if Sam would smirk or suddenly shout, "Ha! Gotcha!"

But nothing of the sort happened, and Gabriel was forced to admit that Sam must have been telling the truth - or at least, what he believed to be the truth.

"Alright, whatever," he said skeptically. "Now, do me a favour, and get out."

Sam looked startled. "What?"

"Get out," Gabriel repeated. "Are there any brains underneath all that hair, or do the roots pierce your skull and suck all the blood out? It's not that hard to understand."

"But… why do you want me to go?" Poor Sam. He looked like he genuinely could not understand why Gabriel was kicking him out. Gabriel narrowed his eyes and turned to Castiel for help.

"Sam, leave," he said. "Gabriel and I would just like some time to talk. He is my best friend, after all, and he did almost just die."

"Fine," Sam relented. "But I'll be right outside the door." It was meant to be reassuring, Gabriel knew, but Castiel had obviously taken it as a threat of sorts. He glared at Sam's back as the man left. Gabriel, on the other hand, actually felt a little better knowing that Sam was going to stay close, even if he knew that he had no chance with the moose for anything other than friendship.

"Castiel, I swear, if you don't explain what the hell is going on right this second," Gabriel threatened, "I'll… do something. I can't really think right now. Whatever drugs they have me on are doing their job, but just know that I will remember this and I will make good on my threats."

"Alright, calm down," Castiel said. "Look, all I know is, I got a call from Dean this morning. He told me that Sam had found you half-dead in the woods last night and that he'd taken you to the hospital. I got here as fast as I could, and then Sam told me that he'd told everyone that you and him are dating so that he'd be able to come in and visit you while you were in the ICU."

"I was in the ICU?"

"Yeah, but only for last night. You'd lost a lot of blood and had a fever, and they wanted to make sure that you didn't have an infection, or something. They gave you a blood transfusion, too. But, anyway, they'd thought you were going to be there for at least another day, but your fever broke and you stabilized much faster than they expected."

Gabriel frowned as he thought. It might have seemed insignificant, but weird shit had been happening to Gabriel for a while now. The freaky tattoos, finding out Chuck was a hunter, and now this? Healing - "stabilizing", actually, but why split hairs? - faster than trained professionals expected?

All of this had started just after he'd met Sam. He had no clue what the hell was going on, but he did know that he had to talk to Sam, asap.

"Have you called your father yet?" Castiel asked, and Gabriel groaned.

"Shit, I forgot to… which hospital are we in?" he asked.

"White Wing Medical Center," Castiel said. Gabriel quickly texted the name to Chuck and then sighed. Leaning back against his headboard, he closed his eyes tiredly and turned towards Castiel.

"What the hell, Cas," he said. Castiel made a noise of agreement, and Gabriel took it as an invitation to continue talking. "When did our lives get so fucked up?"

"For you, I'm pretty sure it was the moment you were born," Castiel deadpanned, trying to lift Gabriel's spirits. It worked, and Gabriel was still laughing when the doctor entered the room. Sam was hot on his heels, and he shot Gabriel a grin when they locked eyes. Gabriel's heart did not flutter. It really didn't. The heart monitor was just broken, and incorrectly registered something that absolutely did not happen. Sam still smirked at him, though, and Castiel still glared at nothing, and, hell, even the doctor gave Gabriel a knowing smile.

He gritted his teeth and did his best to ignore them all. At least, until he turned to the doctor and asked, "So, what's the diagnosis, doc?"

The doctor, who was named Richard Wright, according to his nametag, smiled and lifted Gabriel's chart from where it hung at the foot of his bed.

"Well," he said as he flipped through it, "you came in in last night in quite the state. You had nearly severe blood loss from multiple bite marks, a mild concussion, and were pretty malnourished, as well. Luckily for you, you're a universal recipient, so getting you a transfusion was no problem. We got those bite marks stitched up and gave you a few different types of antibodies in case whatever attacked you had any unsavoury diseases. Speaking of, I know you were pretty out of it last night, but the police came by to try and figure out what attacked you. Do you remember anything?"

Gabriel let his gaze flick to Castiel, who was wearing a carefully constructed mask that completely hid all his emotions. Gabriel couldn't tell the truth, obviously, but he knew Castiel would go through with whatever lie he came up with. Almost unbidden, his eyes wandered over to Sam. His face was a mess of emotions, unlike Castiel's. Gabriel could clearly read anger, pain, and… fear? All of them were warring for dominance in his eyes, which Gabriel could swear were almost glowing. But that was impossible. It had to be a trick of the low light, right?

"No," Gabriel said in response to the doctor's question. Dr. Wright nodded.

"Well, with your concussion, I'm not surprised," he said. "Someone might want to come take a look at the bites to see if they can identify them. I'll just tell them that you aren't to be bothered, shall I?" Gabriel smiled at him gratefully.

"How long will I have to stay here?" he asked.

"We're not exactly sure. You surprised us when you stabilized so quickly last night. We were sure you would have to stay in the ICU for at least another twenty-four hours or so. You might pull off another feat like that and be out of here in a matter of days, but for now, we'll monitor you by the day and see how you progress. We want to get you back up to a healthy weight before we discharge you, and that might take a while."

He gave Gabriel a disapproving look when he mentioned how underweight Gabriel was, though personally Gabriel thought he was exaggerating just a little bit. Sure, he was thinner than he probably should have been, but it's not like he was doing any exerting activities while he hadn't been eating. All he'd done was lie around in bed. That being said, he expected to be released sometime within the next week or so.

"Alright, well, visiting hours were over at nine," Dr. Wright said to Sam and Castiel. "You're welcome to come back tomorrow starting at ten in the morning."

Sam frowned and stepped forward, looking ready to protest, but Gabriel gave an over exaggerated yawn and Sam relented, letting himself be herded out of the room.

"Later, Cas," Gabriel called, and Castiel waved once before he was almost pushed out by the doctor.

"A nurse should be by soon with pajamas and a toothbrush," he said, and then Gabriel was once more alone. He used the time to see if he could stand up on his own without falling over. Luckily, he managed to pull himself to his feet with side effects no worse than a brief bout of dizziness. The pole with his IV on it had wheels, so he dragged it along with him while he carefully walked around the room, examining his new surroundings.

Peeping through a crack in the blinds, he was somewhat pleased to find that his room was facing a brick wall. The hospital was in the shape of a square-ish letter U, with the two - legs? Arms? Whatever. The sticky-outy-bits - being only a foot or two away from each other. He was glad that no one would be able to see into his room from the outside. Much as he loved people, he also valued his privacy, thank-you-very-much.

His bladder also decided that now was a really good time to let him know that he had rather important business to attend to, and he hobbled to the bathroom as fast as he could to relieve himself. The gown, annoying as it was, made it extremely easy to do what he needed to, and if it weren't for the fact that his ass was sticking out of it, he'd just sleep in it.

As it was, he was brought pajamas and a toothbrush, as promised by the doctor, by Emily not long after he'd finished up in the bathroom, and she also gave him a travel size tube of toothpaste, a small hand towel, and a bar of soap that smelled like some kind of spice.

"I know that it can be kind of gross, having to stay in a hospital for prolonged periods of time," she explained. "So, I went out during my break and got you some things."

Gabriel's eyes widened with surprise as he took the gift. "Why?" he asked. "You didn't have to."

"I know, but I wanted to. You've become my favourite patient." She winked at him and smiled, then left, letting him know that lights out was usually around ten. He had a little under half an hour until then, so he amused himself by playing with his phone. He got a text from Chuck at one point that told him his father was on his way and would stop by the next morning, and he felt a moment of anxiety when he remembered that he'd neglected to tell Chuck exactly why he was in the hospital.

When he came by and figured out that Gabriel had gone on a hunt alone…

But there was nothing he could do about it now, except text Chuck and let him know, but he knew better than that. Chuck could be a bit spastic when he was hit with unexpected bursts of emotion, and it wouldn't do for him to get angry and accidentally drive off a cliff or something.

So Gabriel didn't text him, deciding that he would just face Chuck's wrath in person and and hoped that he looked pitiful enough to dissipate it at least a little.

Much to his irritation, all the (insert dry sarcasm here) excitement of talking to Cas, Sam, and the medical personnel had left him exhausted, and he dragged himself into bed and carefully arranged his IV tube. It wouldn't do to rip it out on accident in his sleep. But he probably wouldn't, so he didn't worry about that too much.

He _did_ worry about this whole Sam situation. He looked at it from an unbiased view. Sam had, for about two months, flirted with him and led him to believe that something was growing between them. Then, he'd claimed he was straight when Gabriel asked him out, which, strangely, led Gabriel to spiraling down a steep slope of depression and self-neglect. And _then,_ after supposedly finding Gabriel half-dead in the woods under very suspicious circumstances that he (for some reason) wasn't the least bit curious about, he'd fed the entire staff the completely unnecessary lie that they were dating.

Yeah, it was pretty obvious to see why Castiel was mad at him.

Trying to come up with an explanation for all of that was giving him a headache, so he tried to clear his mind enough to let him drift off to sleep. For the first time in a while, he dreamed of the wolf with the glowing green eyes, the one that made Gabriel feel truly safe in a way nothing else could. Well, nothing except for Sam, that is.

Huh. He'd never made the connection between Sam and the wolf before.

 **So, quick note: I know fuck all about how hospitals actually are, so this whole scene is based off of the knowledge that I got from half an episode of Grey's Anatomy and guesswork.**


	9. Chapter 9

The next day was torture for Gabriel. He spent all day hobbling around the hospital in his pajamas (he refused to go out in that horrible gown), dragging his IV around with him and generally making a nuisance of himself. He pestered the nurses with asinine questions, he explored as many restricted sections as he could before he got caught, and, when that failed, he hung out in the cafeteria and talked with the ladies making the food.

He found that even though they had some pretty good gossip (apparently, there was a huge scandal going on between a female nurse and two male doctors. She was dating one, but then she got caught having sex with the other, and now both doctors were refusing to talk to her, and were dating each other), they could not alleviate his boredom.

He would have entertained himself with his phone, but he didn't have a charger with him and didn't want to risk his phone dying and having no way to contact his father or Castiel. Hospitals, and doctors in general, freaked him out, and he'd made it a point to stay as far away from them as possible. In fact, while most people got annual check-ups, the last time Gabriel went for one was when he was ten. He'd never even gotten blood drawn. Despite all this, he'd always thought that hospitals were generally interesting places.

Thanks to Grey's Anatomy and Chicago Med, he had a perception of hospitals that was sadly proved false by his stay in one. There was not a constant stream of people coming in from car crashes or hiking accidents. Of course, there were the usual hospital things, like broken bones and bronchitis and unusual stomach pains, but the most interesting thing he'd witnessed so far was an angry mom yelling at a nurse because her son was apparently dying of the Bubonic Plague (she'd looked it up on Web M.D. but it turned out that the kid was just having an allergic reaction).

Nothing interesting happened until three o'clock that afternoon. Gabriel was in the Pediatrics Ward, talking to the children who were not sick enough to get their own rooms. He was in the middle of a story about the handsome Gabriel, who was saving the damsel-in-distress Samantha from death by lack of chocolate cupcakes. The kids were super into it, and they all groaned in disappointment when his phone rang and Gabriel stopped the story to answer it.

"Hello?" he said, drowning out the sound of the kids around him discussing the story.

"Hello, Gabriel," came Castiel's voice. "I'm on my way to the hospital. Is there anything you want me to pick up for you from your house?"

"Oh god, yes," Gabriel groaned. "I need my phone charger, clean clothes - you know what I like to wear - and something to eat that's not hospital food."

Castiel chuckled. "I'll pick something up from 7/11 on my way. Has your father visited you yet?"

"No, but he texted me earlier," Gabriel said. "He should be here any minute."

"Good," Castiel said. "Oh, and Sam and Dean are also on their way. They're bringing their father, for the _explanation_."

Castiel's voice was dripping with skepticism, and Gabriel couldn't help but sigh.

"I don't know why they're making such a big deal out of this," he said. "All Sam had to do was tell me why he told everyone we were dating. There was no need to drag his father into it. Also, did he ever ask you about why I was in the woods that night?"

"No," Castiel told him. "I guess he simply assumed that you were taking a walk and were attacked by some animal, though I don't know why he wasn't more suspicious about the whole situation."

"It was very suspicious," Gabriel agreed. "But whatever floats his root beer, I guess."

There was a pause from Castiel's end of the line. "What?" he finally asked.

"Whatever floats his root beer," Gabriel repeated. "Y'know, like that saying, 'Whatever floats your boat', but with root beer, because root beer floats are amazing and deserve their own saying."

Castiel sighed, sounding very put out. "Sure, Gabriel," he said. "I just reached your house. I should be at the hospital in the next half hour or so."

"Don't forget my food!" Gabriel said. "And my charger!"

"I won't," Castiel promised, right before he hung up. Gabriel pocketed his phone, which was now barely hanging on to life at only three percent. One of the kids who was still sitting cross-legged across from him - Jesus, they'd been so quiet after their initial outburst, Gabriel had forgotten they were even there in the first place - spoke up.

"Can we finish the story now?" she asked. Gabriel smiled at her and folded his hands in his lap.

"Of course. Where were we?"

* * *

As soon as he finished the story, a nurse came into the room, asking for him. She said that his father was waiting for him in his room, and Gabriel sighed, knowing that Dr. Wright had probably already talked to Chuck and explained the strange bite marks and the terrible condition Gabriel had been in when he'd been admitted.

Still, Gabriel was no coward. Usually. Not this time, though.

When he got back to his room, he found the door wide open. Chuck jumped up from the bed when he saw Gabriel and he rushed over, grabbing him into a hug and being mindful of the IV.

"Goddammit, Gabriel, don't scare me like that!" he said.

"Um," Gabriel said, more than a little confused. He'd been expecting more yelling. "Did you talk to the doctor yet?"

At this, Chuck pulled back and levelled Gabriel with a stern glare.

"Of course," he said. "I know about the vampires, Gabriel, I'm not stupid."

Gabriel winced. "Not that I'm not okay with this, but why aren't you mad?"

"I finished being mad a while ago," Chuck said dismissively. "Becky called me yesterday and told me she was assigning you to the hunt. But she also told me that it was only one vampire and that you'd have a partner."

"She lied to both of us," Gabriel said, for once not having to lie. Although, he'd known that he wouldn't have a partner when he went on the hunt, but Chuck didn't need to know that.

* * *

Castiel sat in the lone chair in Gabriel's room, watching as he steadily worked his way through a large bag of Doritos. Gabriel's appetite had returned full force once he'd gotten out of his depression. He hadn't realized just how much he'd missed Sam until he'd been face to face with the moose. Simply being in the same room as him had lifted his spirits immeasurably. He'd gotten back the motivation to take care of himself, even if it was just trying to find out why Sam had lied to an entire hospital, and probably the cops, as well.

"You might want to slow down," Castiel said. "It would be terribly pathetic if you survived a vampire attack only to die in your hospital room from accidental inhalation of Doritos."

"Shut up, Cas," Gabriel said, voice muffled through the food in his mouth. "I'm fucking hungry."

"Is she good in bed?" Castiel asked dryly, and Gabriel choked on his chips.

"The best," Gabriel said when he was done coughing, voice hoarse and eyes watering.

"Oh, I don't know about that. You've never seen me in bed," came a voice from the door, and Sam sauntered into the room with a shit-eating grin on his face.

"Not yet," Gabriel said, winking before he could catch himself. Then he frowned, because he'd always been so easily distracted by sex. "Wait, no, stop. I'm mad at you. Have you come to explain why you lied?"

Sam shrugged. "Can't I have come because I wanted to see you?"

"No," Gabriel deadpanned, even as his heart did a flip at the thought of Sam coming to visit him for no reason. He was so glad he wasn no longer hooked up to a heart monitor."Now start explaining."

"Hold on, we have to wait for-," Sam started, but he was interrupted as two more people entered the room. Dean smiled and waved at Gabriel as he went to stand by Castiel. The second person that entered gave off a predatory air so strong that Gabriel had to resist the urge to take a step back from him.

He was as tall as Dean, which meant that he was a lot taller than Gabriel. Short, dark brown hair fell over his forehead and his scruffy beard was peppered with grey. His light brown eyes were sharp as they ran over everything, stopping to rest on Gabriel for just a tic too long before moving on. He was pretty well-muscled, with the same broad shoulders and narrow hips that Sam and Dean had. He was obviously John Winchester.

"Your father, I presume," Gabriel said blandly, gesturing towards John. Sam nodded, and Gabriel clasped his hands together, plastering a huge, fake smile on his face. "Great! Now will someone please explain what the everliving fuck is going on?"

"That's him?" John asked suddenly, nodding towards Gabriel but looking at Sam. "He's shorter than I thought."

"Hey! 'He' has a name, you know. Would it kill you to use it while you're in his fucking hospital room, about to explain why your son is being a douche?" Gabriel growled. John raised a single eyebrow, and then smirked.

"He's got spirit," he said, still not addressing Gabriel. "I've got no doubt that he'll keep you in check."

Sam smiled at John, but Gabriel was about ready to murder someone, and from the look on his face, so was Castiel.

"Sam!" Gabriel snapped. "Explain. Now."

Chuck chose that moment to come back into the room, and all three Winchesters turned to glare at him when he did. Sam even went so far as to bare his teeth like he was a dog, or something. Chuck paused in the doorway, obviously not prepared for there to be strangers in the room, or for them to give him such hostile greetings.

"Stop glaring at my dad," Gabriel demanded, and, strangely enough, all three of them listened and backed off. Chuck raised an eyebrow questioningly at Gabriel, who sighed and shook his head. "Dad, this is Sam and Dean Winchester and their father, John. Winchester assholes - and Dean - this is my father, Chuck Shurley."

Dean grinned at the insult to his family, while Sam and John ignored it in favour of studying Chuck.

"You don't look anything alike," Sam said, voice curious.

Gabriel snorted. "I should hope not. I'm adopted."

All three Winchesters looked at him sharply when he said that, and Gabriel tried not to fidget under his scrutiny.

"That makes sense," John eventually said.

"What makes sense?" Surprisingly, it was not Gabriel who had asked, but Castiel. He moved to stand next to Gabriel, and crossed his arms. His eyes narrowed and he glared at each Winchester in turn. "Someone needs to explain what the hell is going on right now."

"You're right," Sam said, holding his hands out palms up, like he was calming a nervous animal. "I owe you an explanation. Especially you, Gabriel."

"Damn right, you do."

Sam took a deep breath, then paused and eyed the three of them warily. "You might want to sit down for this."

Gabriel rolled his eyes - because, really, how bad could the explanation be? - but sat on the edge of the bed anyway. Chuck and Castiel copied him. Sam breathed in a huge breath and let it out slow.

"Do you believe in werewolves?" he asked, and Gabriel's jaw dropped.

"Oh, my god, Sam, are you a werewolf?" he asked. Chuck stiffened and moved his hand to his belt, probably looking for a weapon that he didn't have.

"I know it's hard to believe, but I am. We all are, in fact."

"Dad and I are hunters," Gabriel deadpanned. "It's not that hard to believe. How do you think I ended up bleeding out in the middle of the woods, anyway? Stupid vampires." That last part was muttered, but Sam must have heard it anyway, because his eyes darkened with anger.

"Don't worry. I took care of them," he growled. Like, literally growled. It was the kind of sound Gabriel would have expected from a real wolf, not a human - even if that human was a werewolf. And, really, he should have seen this coming. The dreams were enough of a clue.

Chuck shot to his feet and pulled Gabriel and Castiel behind him. He glared at the Winchesters suspiciously.

"Werewolves," he said, voice cautious, "only change during the full moon. How did you make that sound? And why are you telling us this? Now I'll have to hunt you down and kill you."

John sighed irritatedly. "Wrong kind."

Chuck blinked. "Pardon?"

"You have the wrong kind of werewolf," John explained. "There are two kinds. The one you think we are is called Canis Lupus Hattai. We are Canis Lupus."

"What's the difference?" Gabriel asked.

"There's a huge difference," Dean said, finally chiming in to the conversation. "Canis Lupus came first, we can control our phase, and we don't eat human hearts."

Chuck narrowed his eyes, and relaxed a fraction. "I've never heard of this," he said. "I was taught that there was one kind of werewolf."

"Well, yeah. We don't want hunters to come after us," Sam said. "The Canis Lupus can pass for human, and we've used this ability to hide among humans for thousands of years."

"Long ago," John started.

"Oh, lord," Gabriel muttered, sitting back down on the bed and pulling Chuck and Castiel down with him. John gave him a sharp look, but then went back to his story.

"Long ago, the creator of the Canis Lupus, the Great Luna, saw that the humans of the world were suffering. Disease, war, poverty - they were destroying each other, so she decided to help. She looked to the wolves, who thrived in communities based on love and supporting each other. She combined the man and the wolf, and the Canis Lupus were born.

"The belief that the wolf and the man are different is only true for the subspecies, Canis Lupus Hattai. With Canis Lupus, or the Grey Wolves, as we are also called, the wolf and man are always aware of each other. When in our wolf forms, we can call on the reasoning of the man, and the man can call on the traits of the wolf, such as his hearing, sight, fangs, or claws.

"We don't change into wolves," John said. "We phase, because we don't completely turn ourselves over to the wolves. The kind hunters go after are called Hokkaido Wolves. They were created when a pack of Greys went rogue hundreds of years ago. They attacked and ate humans. But the Great Luna had installed a… a defect, you could call it, in every Grey.

"If they drank human blood, they would lose themselves to their wolves. The rogue Greys became the werewolves shown in horror movies, the kind who change once a month and can only be killed with silver."

"That's great," Gabriel said. "Really interesting history lesson that I did not ask for. But what does it have to do with me?"

"I was getting there," John grumbled, and Sam apparently decided that it was time for him to take over, because he continued the explanation.

"One of the things the Great Luna admired the most about wolves in the wild was their commitment to each other. Wolves will die for the sake of the pack, for the sake of their mates. Wolves mate for life, you know, and she loved that about them. So, she put that trait in the Grey Wolves."

"Wolves are monogamous," Castiel said dryly. "Who cares? So are most humans."

"Wolves are not just monogamous," Dean explained. "The Greys are monogamous only to one person. Their mate."

"Greys have only one mate that was created just for them," John said. "A soulmate, if you prefer. It can be centuries before a wolf finds his mate, and the ratio is about thirty males to every one female, so finding your mate is a very special thing."

"What does this have to do with me?" Gabriel asked again. At the implication that male wolves only had female mates, he'd felt the first stirrings of the same despair he'd just gotten released from. He tried to hide it, but it looked like Sam saw it anyway.

"Well, it is very rare for a wolf to find his mate early on in his life," he said. "But it has been known to happen. Even rarer is a male finding his mate in another male." Gabriel perked up slightly. "But that also has been known to happen."

"Wait, you can't possibly mean what I think you mean," Castiel said. "Are you saying that Gabriel is your mate?"

Sam beamed at him and nodded, and Gabriel's eyes widened almost comically. For a few moments, all he could do was open and close his mouth like a fish, and after an excruciating long time, he very eloquently said, "What?"

"You're my soulmate," Sam said.

"I can't be," Gabriel said, even as his heart filled with hope. "I'm not a werewolf."

"How do you know?" John countered. "You said you were adopted. Do you know for sure who your parents were?" Gabriel hesitated, and John grinned triumphantly. "You must have some werewolf blood running through your veins, otherwise you and Sam wouldn't have Bonded."

"Bonded?" Chuck said. He turned to Gabriel angrily. "Did you have sex with him?"

"No!" Gabriel said.

"Pity," Sam added, and Gabriel whirled on him angrily. Well, whirled as much as he could while still attached to an IV.

"Shut it, White Fang," he snapped. Then he turned to John. "What do you mean, Bonded?"

"When mates meet for the first time," John said, "they form a Bond. The Bond is the force that connects their souls. However, with half-Greys, or Greys whose wolves lie dormant, like yours, the Bond isn't usually formed until the wolf comes out. It's mostly during times of great stress, or when the wolf knows that they need the help of their mate. The Bond allows mates to speak to each other telepathically and to feel each other's emotions."

"I haven't heard anyone's thoughts but my own," Gabriel said, a little desperately.

 _Are you sure about that?_ a voice that was definitely not his asked. Gabriel couldn't help but jump in surprise a little, and then he glared at Sam.

"Not cool," he said.

...Wait.

"Wait…"

"Did you hear that?" Sam asked excitedly. Gabriel nodded silently, and Sam grinned. "See? I told you, we're mates."

"That's not the only thing that marks mates," Dean said. "When male Greys go through puberty, they develop markings on their bodies that look like tattoos. They determine the wolf's place in the pack hierarchy, and they change when they meet their mate, or when the Bond is established. Marks will appear on the female that match the male's like a puzzle piece."

"Holy shit," Castiel said. He turned to Gabriel, and his gaze flicked to Gabriel's right shoulder. "Show them."

Everyone waited with bated breath and Gabriel struggled out of his t-shirt. Sam inhaled sharply when he saw Gabriel's marks. Slowly, almost like he was in a trance, he stepped closer and reached out to touch them. Gabriel stepped back before his fingers made contact, and Sam's eyes snapped up to meet his. Sam growled, low and dangerous, and his eyes started to glow green. This time, Gabriel was sure that it wasn't a trick of the light.

 _Why do you run from me?_ Sam asked.

"I'm not running from you," Gabriel said. He pulled his shirt back on and took another step back so that he was sitting on the bed again. Sam growled again. His eyes seemed to glow even brighter.

"Leave," he demanded, and Chuck and Castiel spluttered indignantly.

"You can't be serious," the latter said, but Sam was having none of it. He turned to Castiel, and to Gabriel's surprise, Castiel immediately dropped his eyes.

" _Leave_ ," Sam growled again.

"Cas," Dean hissed. "Come on, man. We don't want to get in between a wolf and his mate."

Gabriel couldn't look away from Sam's eyes. They bored into his own, and held more emotions than he could count.

"Castiel," he said. "It's fine. I need to talk to Sam alone, anyway."

They obviously didn't like it, but Chuck and Castiel left with Dean and John, and then Sam and Gabriel were alone.

 _Gabriel,_ Sam said in his mind, and that was going to take some getting used to.

"Yes?" Gabriel asked, and Sam growled.

 _Gabriel._ His voice was more insistent, more desperate, and Gabriel suddenly realized what he wanted.

 _Yes?_ he said in his mind, and he felt more than saw the moment Sam received his thought. The wolf - freaky - relaxed a bit, and his eyes lost their glow. Now that he was acknowledging it, Gabriel realized that through the Bond, which he could see in his mind as a braided golden thread, he could feel Sam's emotions.

 _You can do more than that,_ Sam said. _You can access my memories, my thoughts, and I can do the same to yours._

"No privacy?" Gabriel asked.

"There's a way to put up a mental block," Sam said, and Gabriel was relieved when he stopped speaking telepathically. It felt… intimate, close in a way that Gabriel knew they weren't ready for yet. "We _are_ ready, Gabe. We were literally born ready. The Great Luna made us for each other."

"Why is she called the Great Luna?" Gabriel asked, instead of addressing the main focus of what Sam had said.

"Because she's the spirit of the moon." Sam moved to sit down on the bed and Gabriel let him. Before he was consciously aware of it, he was leaning into Sam's warmth, and Sam's arm was wrapping around his shoulders. "What's bothering you? And don't say nothing, I can feel your emotions, remember?"

Gabriel paused before answering. "If I'm your mate," he said softly, "why did you reject me a week ago?"

Sam tensed minutely, and then forced himself to relax.

"I didn't know you were my mate then," he said. "You have to understand, Gabriel, that in our culture, we are raised knowing that there is only one person out there that is destined for us, destined to love us completely, to be the other halves of our souls. Two males or two females being mated is so rare that no Grey ever teaches his cubs that. I expected to be mated to a female, and I was not prepared for how quickly I developed feelings for you, or for how strong they were."

"Me, too," Gabriel said, and Sam squeezed his shoulders.

"I didn't know you were part Grey, obviously, and I didn't want to start something with you knowing that I would eventually have to leave you. But I couldn't help the fact that I was drawn to you. And then… actually, I can just show you. Close your eyes."

Gabriel eyed him dubiously, but he trusted Sam, and so he complied. And then he wasn't him anymore.

 _My ceiling hadn't changed in the last hour, but I couldn't stop staring at it. My thoughts were a mess, and at the center of it all was him._

 _Gabriel._

 _I didn't know whether or not I was in love with him, but I knew that I felt something for him. Something incredibly strong. But how could I, when I was going to meet my mate eventually? I could have a fling with him, maybe date him until I found her, but I knew I wouldn't be able to._

 _I didn't have it in me to hurt Gabriel like that; just the thought of causing Gabriel pain made my stomach twist with nausea._

 _The clock on my bedside table told me it was only six in the evening. I had already been lying there since noon. Ever since Gabriel had asked me out, I'd been assaulted with strange feelings. Elation, first of all, that Gabriel returned my attraction. But after I told him I was straight, there was guilt and incredible sadness._

 _Gabriel didn't come to school for a week after that, and I was worried. In the entire time Gabriel and I had been friends, Gabriel hadn't been absent even once. Suddenly missing a week of school was suspicious. Gabriel didn't return any of my calls or texts, and then Castiel had started giving me the cold shoulder, and I was so confused. And worried. But mostly worried._

 _A knock on my door interrupted my melancholy thoughts, and I turned my head enough to see who it was. Dad came into the room, and he sighed when he saw me._

" _You are a mess," he said, sitting on the edge of the bed. He reached out and placed his hand on my arm, and I felt instantly comforted by that one simple action. "What's got you into such a state? Even Dean's starting to worry."_

 _I shrugged. How much should I tell him, if I even did decide to tell him anything at all? Dad had never been the touchy-feely type. Well, not by Grey standards. To humans, he would appear tactile, just like all Greys, if a little bit less. Feelings were more of Mom's department than Dad's, but it had been Dad who taught me about mates in the first place, not Mom._

" _I don't know," I finally said. "I'm just trying to figure some things out."_

" _Well, this wouldn't be the first time that's happened, but it would be the first time you've laid in bed being depressed all weekend because of it. You've been acting weird all week. Don't think I didn't notice." He finally withdrew his hand, and I sat up and sat cross-legged on my bed, facing him._

 _I took a deep breath to try to calm my nerves. "Dad, can two males or two females be mates?" I asked. He looked surprised by my question, and he tilted his head in thought._

" _There have been a few recorded instances in which that's happened, though it is very rare because we already have enough trouble continuing our species as it is," he said. "Why? Do you think you've found your mate in another male?"_

" _I don't know," I answered truthfully. "I really like him - like, a lot. Maybe even love, but I have nothing to compare it to but what I feel for the pack, but that's completely different." Dad nodded in encouragement, so I continued. "But there haven't been any mating signs. My marks haven't changed, I haven't heard his thoughts, his scent hasn't changed and nothing new has happened to it. Although…"_

" _Although," Dad prompted._

" _Although, I haven't seen him for a week, so I wouldn't know. He asked me out last weekend, and I told him I was straight," I admitted. Dad looked at me thoughtfully, obviously deep in thought._

" _He likes you back," he finally said. "Why not just date him for a while? High school relationships rarely last, anyway."_

" _Yeah, but I don't want to hurt him," I said. "I'd rather pull my nails off with pliers."_

" _That's a little extreme, don'tcha think?" Dad said. "But if you haven't seen him since you rejected him, it sounds like this is bothering him as much as it's been bothering you. Maybe more, considering you've been going to school and he hasn't."_

 _That was true. I grimaced. Maybe I had hurt Gabriel, which was exactly what I'd been trying to avoid doing. The guilt flashed hot in my gut, and I took another deep breath. I needed to clear my head. A run should help. It always did._

 _I told Dad as much, and he didn't say anything as I pulled on a pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt. Most of the pack was in the dining room eating dinner, so I managed to get out without having to deal with the barrage of questions about my strange behaviour that would inevitably come if I encountered anyone._

 _The cool night air helped to clear my head a little, but I couldn't fully escape the guilt, or the longing, so I started to run. It was only fifteen minutes later that I realized I was heading the way I would go to get to school, or Gabriel's house. I scowled, but didn't turn around._

 _I lived in an entirely different city than Gabriel did. His house was about half an hour away from mine by car when there was no traffic, and it would take me only an hour to run there if I didn't pace myself. Wolves, whether werewolves or actual wolves, have an uncanny ability to run almost indefinitely without getting tired. Immeasurable endurance had come in handy a lot in the past, especially when I had been on my middle school track team, and it would come in handy now._

 _I let my thoughts wander as I ran, my muscle memory guiding me subconsciously along sidewalks and through back alleys. I didn't know what to do. Should I start something with Gabriel, even knowing that I'd have to leave him eventually?_

 _About half an hour after I left the house, I felt something tickling at the back of my mind. Trepidation. It made me run just a little bit faster, and my skin break out in the first signs of a sweat. With a jolt, I realized that it wasn't me who was feeling anxious. My eyes widened when I realized that I was feeling my mate's feelings._

 _And she was scared._

 _Protectiveness flared within me and I pushed back against the new presence - her presence - in my mind. Instantly, I realized three things. One: my mate was Gabriel. Two: Dad was going to flip. Three: Gabriel was being attacked._

 _Through Gabriel's eyes, I could see a figures standing over him. His teeth were unnaturally sharp and jagged, and the hunger in his eyes was plain as day. Vampire. I wasn't getting anything from Gabriel's thoughts but nearly overwhelming fear, but I was able to pick out one bit of helpful information._

 _He was at the large park - more of a small woods, actually - in the center of town. I'd seen it a few times, back when Castiel, Dean, Gabriel, and I used to hang out nearly all the time. It would take me another half hour to get there at the current pace I was going, but Gabriel didn't have half an hour._

 _The wolf in me pushed against my control. He was nearly rabid with the need to get to Gabriel. For once, I didn't fight him. One second I was human, and the next, I was a wolf, running twice as fast as I was in my human form._

 _I blocked out everything, all the noises, thoughts, and smells that didn't have anything to do with Gabriel. I kept my mind open to his, monitoring his thoughts and making sure that he was still alive. He was running from the vampires now, but he knew that he wouldn't be able to outrun them._

 _I pushed myself to go faster._

 _I could see the woods looming up ahead of me. In my mind, Gabriel was knocked down and something heavy settled on his back, and then there was pain, pain, pain, as the vampire sunk his teeth into him. I saw red and bounded across the road, not caring that I almost got hit by at least three different cars._

 _I hit Gabriel's scent when I got to the tree line, and I followed it deeper and deeper into the woods._

Helphelphelphelphelphelphelphelphelp! _I heard in my mind, and I snarled with fury and ran faster. Gabriel's presence in my mind began to grow weaker, and I finally located him and the vampires. The sight of the two filthy blood-suckers with their mouths over my mate filled me with a rage unlike anything I had ever felt before, and I leaped at one of the vampires just as I felt Gabriel slip away from my mind._

 _For a moment, my heart stopped. But then I realized that he was still alive, just unconscious, and I turned my attention to the vampire underneath my paws. It hissed at me and I wasted no time in ripping its throat out, then pulling the head the rest of the way off. Red blood sprayed into my face and encouraged my bloodlust, and I turned to the other one._

 _It was still crouched over Gabriel, who was far too still and pale. It licked its lips and grinned at me, and I crouched low and growled a warning. We launched ourselves at each other at the same time, but it didn't have the advantage that I did, the rage that gave me more strength than I should have had._

 _Its head went flying, and I hurried over to Gabriel. Phasing back to human, I ignored the cold wind biting my naked skin. There were two groups of multiple bites each that were steadily gushing blood, one on his shoulder and one on his forearm. I growled and knew that my eyes were glowing green, but there was nothing I could do to abate the wolf's anger._

 _I found Gabriel's phone in one of his pockets and used it to call 911, and then I stripped the male vampire of his clothes and and slipped them on. They were a little tight, but they would have to do. The female vampire's clothes I ripped into strips and used to try and stem the flow of blood from Gabriel's wounds. When I was more or less satisfied with my handiwork, I lifted both vampires and dumped a few meters away from where Gabriel was._

 _Then, I used Gabriel's phone again to call my father. There was a lot I had to tell him._

* * *

 **Sorry this chapter is so late, guys. I was on a camping trip on an island for the past few days and there was absolutely no cell service.**


	10. Chapter 10

Gabriel felt light-headed when he finally pulled out of Sam's memories, and he didn't know whether it was because of the telepathy itself, coming back to himself after dealing with Sam's all-consuming rage, or just because he'd finally realized just how close to dying he'd come.

He shook his head to clear it, and then he looked up at Sam, who was looking down at him with a slightly worried expression on his face.

"That was pretty intense," Gabriel said, trying to break the silence that had descended. Sam snorted.

"Intense is putting it mildly," he said. Then his voice softened and got quiet. "I was so terrified that I'd be too late."

He looked so sad and lost that Gabriel couldn't help but reach out a hand and use it to cup Sam's face. Sam leaned into his touch, and Gabriel smiled.

"You weren't, though," he said. "I'm still here because of you."

"And I'm still here because you are, too," Sam said, and Gabriel frowned in confusion. Sam must have seen it - or felt it through the Bond - because he explained. "I couldn't live in a world without you in it. If you had died, I would have followed not long after."

"What?" Gabriel cried. "Why?"

"Would you want to live in a world without me in it?" Sam asked. Gabriel didn't even have to think about it before answering.

"Of course not," he said.

"Then why would you assume that I would?" Sam asked. Gabriel didn't have a good answer for that, so he looked at his arm and started fiddling with the tape keeping his IV in place. "It's a part of the Bond, anyway."

"What do you mean?" Gabriel asked.

"When we complete the Blood Rites," Sam said, "our lives will be connected. If you die, I will, too, and vice versa."

"Blood Rites?"

"It's a ceremony. It solidifies the Bond between mates and ensures that no one else will mate with either of them. Even if a Grey has met his or her mate, they can still do the Rites with another wolf. Once they do the Rites with their true mate, though, nothing will be able to break the Bond."

Gabriel was silent as he thought about all that he'd just been told. It was very hard to believe that he was not only a werewolf, but the soulmate of one, as well, but apparently it was true. His marks and the fact that he and Sam could communicate telepathically was proof of that.

In the crack between the door and the floor, he could see the outline of four pairs of feet. If he strained his ears, he could just make out the sounds of John talking. He caught the words 'Blood Rites', and realized that he and Dean must have been explaining to Chuck and Castiel what Sam had just explained to him.

"Gabriel?" Sam said, voice tinged with worry.

"I can't believe I'm a fucking werewolf," Gabriel said. He finally released the tape he was picking at and leaned back into Sam. "What even is my life. Wait, does this mean I can turn into a wolf?"

"Your wolf is dormant still," Sam said. "So, no. But you should still heal fast. Not as fast as a full Grey, but definitely faster than a human." He stood up from the bed, and Gabriel's hand shot out and grabbed his wrist before he could even take one step.

"Are you leaving?" Gabriel asked, voice desperate. Sam's gaze softened and he pulled Gabriel to his feet, and then into his chest for a hug. His arms wrapped around Gabriel's waist tightly, and Gabriel didn't hesitate to return the affection.

"I have to go," Sam explained. "But I'll come back tomorrow before school, and in the afternoon, if you want me to."

"Why wouldn't I want you to?"

Sam pulled back just enough to look Gabriel in the eye, and the latter could see something akin to relief in his eyes.

"So you do want me?" Sam asked. "You do want to be my mate?"

"Of course I do!" Gabriel said. Just the thought of not being with Sam, of rejecting him, or being rejected made his heart constrict painfully and tears prickle at the backs of his eyes.

"Good," Sam said. "Because I don't think I could have handled it if you didn't."

He leaned down and buried his face Gabriel's hair, and then he…

"Did you just sniff me?" Gabriel asked, wrinkling his nose. Sam had the grace to look embarrassed.

"Um, yeah. But I can't help it. You smell amazing."

"Wait, in the memory you showed me, you said that a Grey's scent will change when they meet their mate?" Gabriel asked. Sam nodded. "What do I smell like?"

"You used to smell like strawberries and mint," Sam said. "But now you smell like chocolate, too." He cocked his head curiously. "Do I smell like anything to you?"

Gabriel's cheeks heated up with embarrassment, and he looked at the ground instead of at Sam.

"Old books, lemons, and something... musty. Like dust," he admitted. Sam wrinkled his nose.

"Dust?" he repeated. Then he shrugged. "Whatever. I have to go. I still do have school tomorrow, you know."

Gabriel groaned. He'd forgotten about school. He'd have so much work to catch up on when he finally got discharged from the hospital.

Sam laughed and promised to be back the next day, and then Gabriel was alone in his room. Not even ten seconds later, Chuck and Castiel burst into the room and headed straight towards him.

"Are you okay?" Castiel asked. Gabriel nodded.

"I can't believe you're a werewolf," Chuck said, and Gabriel glanced at him worriedly.

"Does that… bother you?" he asked.

"Of course not," Chuck assured him. "I know you'd never hurt anyone, so we should have no problems. It's just ironic, that's all."

Gabriel sighed in relief.

* * *

The next week passed by almost in a blur. He spent his days having telepathic conversations with Sam, exploring the Bond more. In the afternoons, Sam would come visit him in the hospital and they'd end up talking or just sitting silently, enjoying each other's company, until the nurses kicked him out.

Castiel and Chuck also visited everyday. Well, Castiel visited. Chuck was there almost all the time, and saying that he visited would imply that he ever left. He'd called Becky and made sure that she wouldn't assign him on any more hunts for a while, and it wasn't like he worked aside from writing a bestselling series of novels.

Gabriel's IV came out on Tuesday, and he was discharged on Friday. He was back up to a healthy weight, and the bite marks on his shoulder and arm had healed enough that the stitches had already dissolved. It baffled the doctors, how quickly he healed, but Chuck spouted some bullshit about good genes and how he'd always healed fast, and they dropped it.

He made it back home around eleven on Friday night, and the first thing he did was go upstairs to his bathroom and take a shower, since he hadn't been able to at all during the past few days. While he was waiting for the water to warm up, he looked into the mirror and studied his markings.

Sam had told him that the markings on his back matched Gabriel's, and as Gabriel traced the outline of his marks with his eyes, he could almost picture what Sam's would look like.

 _Well, I should hope not. It would kinda ruin the surprise if you knew what they looked like before I actually showed you._

Gabriel smiled, and turned away from the mirror. Sam was a near constant presence in his mind now, and he'd gotten infinitely more comfortable with the Bond between them. It was almost second nature for him to answer in his mind.

 _The suspense is killing me, Sammy,_ he said, and he heard Sam chuckle in his mind. The sound never failed to bring a smile to his face, and the effect wasn't diminished by the fact that he hadn't heard it out loud.

 _How are you doing?_

 _I'm fine. What about you?_

 _Same old,_ Sam said, and Gabriel could picture him shrugging. The water finally warmed up enough for Gabriel to step under the spray, and he tried not to look down at himself too much as he scrubbed himself with soap. He knew that, eventually, his and Sam's relationship would get physical, but he still wanted to maintain whatever illusion of privacy he still had.

 _If I'm making you uncomfortable, I can wait until you're done,_ Sam said.

 _You're not,_ Gabriel assured him. _Just… keep your mind's eye not on me, okay?_

 _I can do that._

They didn't say anything for a few moments after that, though Gabriel could still feel Sam's presence in his mind. The silence wasn't awkward, and Gabriel broke it not because he felt he had to, but because he was actually curious about something.

 _Sam,_ he said.

 _Hmm?_

 _Do you remember when, a few days ago, Dean said that the markings were indicative of a wolf's place in the pack's hierarchy? What did he mean?_

 _Well,_ Sam said, _the pack is structured kind of like a pack in the wild. With Greys, there is the Alpha, who leads the pack. Then comes the Beta, who is second in command to the Alpha, and the other wolves are organized into order based on dominance after that. In a pack, there are usually dominants and submissives. My pack is pretty small, so we only have dominant males._

 _No dominant females?_ Gabriel asked. He squirted a glob of shampoo into his hand and started lathering his hair up.

 _Females can be mated to a dominant, but they're on a whole other scale when it comes to dominance. They don't carry the same amount of power that a dominant male has._

 _Gotcha._

 _So, like I was saying, the marks let other males know where in the pack you stand. If the markings are on the right side of the body, that means you're a dominant. If they come onto the front of your body, you have the potential to be an Alpha._

 _Mine come onto my chest. Do yours, as well?_

 _Yeah. Dean and I both have the potential to be Alphas, which will become a problem when the time comes for one of us to take over the pack. But that's at least a few centuries in the future. I don't think Dad will kick the bucket anytime soon._

 _How long do Greys usually live for?_ Gabriel wondered.

 _Four or five centuries, usually,_ Sam said, and Gabriel's eyes widened.

 _When we complete the Blood Rites and our lives become synched or whatever, does that mean that you'll only live as long as I do?_

 _It means that you will inherit my longevity, and if I live a natural life of a few hundred years, then so will you._

Gabriel finished rinsing the last suds from his hair and shut off the water.

 _Oh. That's cool._ He didn't know how, but he could tell that Sam yawned just then, and then he felt his mate's exhaustion through the Bond. _You should go to sleep._

 _But I wanna talk to you,_ Sam whined. Gabriel chuckled and stepped out of the shower, then started drying himself off with his towel.

 _I'll be here until you fall asleep,_ he promised. _And we'll see each other tomorrow._

 _Fine,_ Sam agreed reluctantly. Gabriel finished drying his hair and wrapped the towel around his waist for the short walk to his room. He paused at Chuck's door and listened for any signs of life, but the deep breathing and the fact that the lights were turned off let him know that his father had already fallen asleep.

He continued on to his room and pulled on a pair of boxers and a t-shirt, then slipped into his bed.

 _Goodnight, Sam,_ he said. Sam didn't reply, and Gabriel felt through the Bond that he was already asleep. He must have been exhausted. Gabriel didn't feel all that tired yet, so he gently started prodding around in Sam's mind, watching his dreams. They went by too fast for him to make much sense of them, but he saw that he seemed to be the most prominent theme, along with a sense of happiness from Sam whenever the moose saw his face.

It filled Gabriel with warmth to know that Sam loved Gabriel as much as Gabriel loved him. Not that he had doubted Sam's feelings; they were soul mates, after all, literally made for each other by the Great Luna and destined for each other since birth.

He thought that the story of the Great Luna was a beautiful one, even if he didn't really believe in it. He wasn't a religious person in general, but what the Greys had wasn't really religion, per say. They believed that the Luna had created them to try and help humans, but they didn't worship her or pray to her.

Sam had described her to Castiel and the latter had drawn a picture that Sam and Dean said was as accurate as they could get considering that no one had ever seen her before. Castiel and Sam were quickly restoring the friendship that had been lost two weeks ago. It helped that Sam had been trying to protect Gabriel and had good intentions.

The glowing red numbers of his digital clocked changed and let him know that it was twelve o'clock already, and Gabriel pulled out of Sam's dreams and tried to get some sleep. He was going to meet Sam's pack for the first time tomorrow morning - or, should he say this morning? - and he wanted to be well-rested.

* * *

His alarm went off around eight the next morning, and though it was a few hours after he normally woke up for school, he was so out of it that after he got up to turn it off that he started his routine for getting ready for school. He was already heading out the door with his backpack on before he remembered what was going on, and then he stomped back into the house and up the stairs and practically threw his bag onto his bed.

 _What did that bag ever do to you?_ Sam asked, and Gabriel felt a smile creep onto his face despite his annoyance with himself. Sam never failed to have that effect on him. _Are you nervous?_

 _About what?_ Gabriel asked.

 _About meeting my family today._

 _Not really,_ Gabriel said. He went back to his closet to pick something else to wear, because what he wore to school and what he wore outside of school were vastly different. _I mean, what's the worse that could happen?_

 _You're supposed to be nervous,_ Sam said, sounding just a little put out. Gabriel rolled his eyes fondly and finally decided to wear a pair of jeans and a black t-shirt that said 'If you can read this, you're too close'.

 _Sorry to disappoint,. Anyway, I'm leaving now. See you soon._

 _Bye,_ Sam said, but Gabriel could still feel his presence in his mind. This time when he went downstairs, Chuck was in the kitchen, sipping at a cup of coffee. He lifted his mug in greeting without looking away from his laptop.

"Morning," he said.

"Morning," Gabriel replied. "Whatcha doin'?"

"Don't slur like that, Gabriel," Chuck complained. "I'm just going through a newspaper article for Becky. She wants me to see if I can find anything that could clue her in as to what's attacking people down in Miami."

"Sounds fun," Gabriel said sarcastically. "Anyways, I'm off now."

"Wait, where are you going?" Chuck asked. "Don't you want to take it easy, at least for a while?"

"I feel fine, Dad," Gabriel said. "I'm a Grey Wolf, so I heal fast. Or something. Point is, I feel fine. Besides, I'll be with Sam, and he'll make sure nothing happens."

Chuck eyed him suspiciously. "I want you to text me every hour, on the hour. And if he tries anything, use the silver knife I gave you, okay?"

Gabriel rolled his eyes. "They're different from the werewolves you normally hunt, remember? They don't attack humans, and silver won't hurt them any more than it would hurt a human." He grinned. "Besides, Sam and I are soulmates."

Chuck made an indignant sound and Gabriel laughed and danced out the door before he could say anything.

 _Did you have to do that? He already hates me enough as it is,_ Sam said.

 _He doesn't hate you,_ Gabriel said as he walked to his car. _He hates the fact that I'm planning on spending the rest of my life with a werewolf. You can't blame him. I mean, he's been hunting things since before he adopted me. It's only natural that he's suspicious._

 _I can understand that,_ Sam said. _I'm already at the restaurant. Did you make a reservation?_

 _It's iHop,_ Gabriel pointed out. _How busy could it be at eight thirty in the morning on a Saturday?_

 _Pretty busy, actually. But the hostess said the wait for a table for two is only about ten minutes, so it should be ready by the time you get here._

 _Perfect._

It turned out that Sam was right, and their table became available just as Gabriel was walking into the restaurant. He pushed his way through the crowd of frazzled parents and their rambunctious kids, coming to a stop near the front, where Sam was standing next to a smiling brunette.

"Is this everybody?" she asked cheerfully when Gabriel joined them.

"Yup," Gabriel said.

"Great! If you'll follow me to your table…"

The waitress led them to a secluded table in the back corner of the restaurant. It was far enough from the kitchens that they wouldn't be bothered by a constant stream of waiters and waitresses, and it faced the exits, which Gabriel thought Sam's wolf would appreciate.

He was getting better at separating the two. They were the same entity, Sam and his wolf, but at the same time they could have different desires and priorities. It was usually when Sam's eyes started to glow green that Gabriel knew the wolf was in charge. That hadn't happened since that day in the hospital when Sam had first explained everything.

"So," Gabriel said with a shit-eating grin on his face. "Come here often?."

Sam groaned. "Really?" he said. "Couldn't you think of something more original to say?"

"Of course I could," Gabriel said, and left it at that.

"You're so weird," Sam said.

"I'm going to take that as a compliment."

"Good. It was meant as one."

Gabriel smiled.


	11. Chapter 11

After they finished their breakfast, they headed back out to their cars. Gabriel was surprised to see that Dean had lent Sam the Impala.

"It's a rare occurrence," Sam said, picking up on his thoughts, "but it has been known to happen."

Gabriel got into his car and Sam got into the Impala, and then the two of them started the drive to Sam's house. It took about half an hour, and they spent the entire ride speaking telepathically to each other about everything that came to mind.

Gabriel didn't know what he was expecting of Sam's house, but he certainly wasn't expecting it to be so big. His own house wasn't small - in fact, it was rather large for just two people - but he couldn't help the way his eyes widened when he pulled into the driveway.

 _There're a lot of people who live here,_ Sam said. _So the house has to be big._

 _It's more of a mansion than a house,_ Gabriel replied. He got out of his car and followed Sam up the walk, and was surprised when Castiel opened the door before they could even get to the top steps.

"Cas? What are you doing here?" Gabriel asked.

"Dean picked me up this morning," Castiel said. "He wanted me here for moral support, or something."

Dean appeared at Castiel's elbow. "No," he disagreed. "I said it was because you said that you and Gabriel are as close as brothers, and since Gabriel is part of the pack now, you might as well be, too."

Gabriel blinked. "Wait, part of the pack?"

"Well, yeah. You're Sam's mate, which means that you have the protection and support of the pack." Dean turned to Castiel and the two of them locked eyes. "And so do you."

"Cool," Gabriel said after a moment long moment. "I have a werewolf posse."

Dean snorted and opened the door wider. "Just come in. Everyone's waiting for you." He turned and walked into the house, Castiel right behind him, and Gabriel raised an eyebrow as he followed.

 _Did you see that?_ he asked Sam.

 _Yup._

 _There was a lot of something in that look your brother and my best friend shared._

 _What kind of something?_ Sam asked.

 _The kind of something you usually see right before the male and female leads in an action movie start sucking face._

 _Oh._

 _Yeah, "oh" is right._

Dean led them through tall halls, and Gabriel lost count of how many turns they made. After what seemed like forever but could only have been five minutes, they reached a large, white door. Dean put his hand on the knob and turned to look at Gabriel and Castiel.

"Okay," he said, "Cas, don't touch Ellen or Jo. Gabriel's mated, so he should be fine. But both of you, don't look Dad or Bobby in the eye, don't ask anything personal, and, for god's sake, don't make nerdy references in front of Charlie."

"Got it," Gabriel said. "Have a staring contest with Bobby, ask everyone whether or not they've been neutered, and tell Charlie that the One Ring has awakened."

Dean sighed so hard his whole body seemed to shift. "Why do I even bother?" he muttered as he opened the door. He led the way inside, and Sam made Gabriel and Castiel walk in before him.

 _Wow,_ he thought to Sam. _Do they do this every time they meet someone new, or am I special?_

Sam sighed.

The room appeared to be a living room. A flat screen TV was mounted on the wall across from the door, and there was a large sofa and two armchairs facing it. A black coffee table sat in front of the sofa, and on it sat two half-eaten bowls of popcorn. Almost the whole left wall was windows, which were cracked to let in the breeze. There was still a ton of space in the room, which meant that there was a ton of space for the two huge wolves who stood in the middle of it.

One was obviously male, and he was bigger and had broader shoulders. His fur was long and shaggy and a murky brown colour, and he had his ass in the air in the classic doggy play-with-me pose. His tail was wagging and his tongue lolled out of his mouth; if it weren't for the fact that he was much too large, Gabriel could have mistaken him for a domesticated dog.

He was pretty sure that the other wolf was female. She was smaller, for one thing, and slimmer, too. Her fur was so light that it could have been blonde, but unlike the other wolf, she did not appear to be playing. Her teeth were bared and a growl rumbled low in her throat. She was low to the ground, tense and obviously ready to spring.

And standing between them was a man. He was a little older than John, it looked like, and he was wearing a faded blue baseball cap. He was facing the male wolf threateningly and his eyes were glowing dark brown, an obvious sign that his wolf was going to make an appearance very soon.

There were other people in the room, too, and they were watching the wolves and the man with interest. One woman in particular seemed ready to jump into the middle of what was shaping up to be a fight.

Everything froze when the door opened and Gabriel, Sam, Castiel, and Dean walked in.

Dean sighed again.

"Seriously, guys?" Sam said, his tone exasperated. "You two couldn't have done this later? You had to choose the exact moment I bring my mate home?"

Gabriel felt a thrill race up his spine when Sam used 'mate' and 'home' in reference to him, but he didn't let himself be distracted. Sam didn't seem worried, but there were still two unknown wolves in the room, one of whom was looking particularly murderous, and he didn't want to be caught unawares.

"Nice first impression," Dean remarked. He walked into the room and scratched the male wolf behind the ears. "Gabe and Cas will never forget this, you know."

"Both of you go phase and get dressed," said the man who was standing between the wolves. When neither of them moved, his eyes glowed even brighter. "Now!"

With his words came the urge to go, to leave the room, but Gabriel frowned and fought against it. Both wolves whined faintly and slunk out the door, and Gabriel tilted his head when the urge disappeared with them.

"Did you feel that?" he asked Castiel, but Cas just looked at him like he was crazy.

"That was me," the man with the baseball cap said. "I'm the Beta of this pack, which means that I'm more dominant than everyone here 'cept for John."

Gabriel tilted his head. "But what does dominance have to do with… whatever the hell just happened?"

"With Greys, the way dominants keep the peace is by using their dominance to enforce orders. Less dominant wolves are physically unable to ignore or resist an order from a wolf more dominant than they," John said. "That is the push you felt."

"Strange," Castiel said. John shrugged.

"I didn't make the rules," he said. His eyes became glazed for a moment, and when he shook himself back to awareness, he looked vaguely sheepish. His eyes darted to the woman at his side, and Gabriel guessed that she was his mate and they'd spoken telepathically. "Anyway, where are my manners? Come in, sit down. Make yourselves at home."

 _Was he talking to your mother?_ Gabriel asked. He felt pride from Sam flow through the Bond at him figuring that out on his own.

 _Yeah. She hates it when people are rude. She was raised down south, and manners are a pretty big thing down there._

Gabriel and Castiel sat down on the sofa, and Sam and Dean sat on either side of them, boxing them in and preventing anyone else from getting too close.

Things calmed down a lot after that. Gabriel and Castiel were introduced to the entire pack, and it was quite a lot of people even though Sam said that theirs was one of the smaller packs.

Mary was John's mate, the Alpha female of the pack, and the mother of Sam and Dean. She was very pretty, with wavy blonde hair and pale green eyes. Crows feet at the edges of said eyes alluded to a lifetime spent laughing and smiling. She was perhaps one of the nicest women that Gabriel had ever met, and seemed nothing but ecstatic that her son had found his mate, even if it was with another male.

Bobby Singer was the man who'd ordered the two fighting wolves, who were apparently named Ash and Jo, to phase back to human. He was the Beta, and seemed gruff and intimidating, but Sam assured Gabriel that he was really an old softie.

Ellen Harvelle was Bobby's mate ("Why don't they have the same last name?" "Because they were never married in the human way. Very few wolves ever do anything other than the Blood Rites."). She was as severe looking as Bobby, but her brown eyes were warm and she had a maternal air to her that helped Gabriel relax some.

Jo was Ellen's daughter, and the adopted daughter of Bobby. When she came back to the room, no longer a wolf, Gabriel could see the resemblance, but Jo also looked kind of like Mary Winchester. They were both very pretty and had the same wavy blonde hair. According to Sam, they also had the same spitfire attitude and spunky disposition.

Ash came back shortly after Jo did. He was really laid-back, so much so that Sam had to assure Gabriel that no, Ash was not stoned, he was like this all the time. Gabriel eventually concluded that he was an eighties rock fan. The mullet, sleeveless leather vest, and the tattoo on his upper arm only supported that theory.

Rufus was a lot like Bobby, though Sam told him that he was a lot less forgiving. Garth was a sweetheart, Jody was very sarcastic, and Charlie was super friendly. They all accepted him and Castiel immediately, and seemed very happy that he and Sam were mates.

"So," Charlie said slyly. "When are you going to do the Blood Rites?"

Sam rolled his eyes fondly. "We're going to wait. Gabe only just found out that he was a Grey, I don't think we need to freak him out even more."

But Gabriel could feel the longing and the impatience through the Bond that belied Sam's statement. He wanted to Bond, and he wanted to do it as soon as possible.

 _We'll get there,_ Gabriel assured him. _I want to do this Bonding thing, too, Sam, but… I mean, I haven't even finished high school yet._

 _I won't rush you, Gabe,_ Sam said. _We'll wait until you're ready._

The hours passed like minutes, and before he knew it, it was already four in the afternoon and they were saying goodbye to everyone. Sam insisted on walking Gabriel and Castiel back to Gabriel's car.

"See you tomorrow?" Sam asked.

"Definitely," Gabriel replied, grinning. He was still grinning when he pulled out of the driveway, and he continued to grin until Castiel smirked smugly at him.

"Oh, you have got it bad," he said.

"Well, I should hope so," Gabriel said lightly. "We're soulmates, and all that."

Castiel's smile softened and he leaned back in his seat. "Don't say that to your father. He might have an aneurism."

Gabriel's eyes widened. "Shit! I forgot to call Dad."

"When were you supposed to call him?"

"Um, every hour on the hour starting around nine this morning?" Gabriel said sheepishly. Castiel facepalmed. Gabriel pulled out his phone and grimaced when he saw the eighty text messages and twenty-nine missed calls from Chuck.

He briefly debated not calling - he'd be home in less than half an hour anyway - but thought it wiser to let Chuck know that he wasn't dead and then let him calm down before he got home.

"Hello?" Chuck sounded frantic when he picked up the phone, and Gabriel winced guiltily.

"Hey, Dad," he wheedled. "What's up?"

There was a pause. "Gabriel," Chuck said again, his voice steady and deadly calm. "If this is not a call to let me know that you are either in the hospital again or being held for ransom, I am going to ground you for the rest of your life."

"Define 'held for ransom'," Gabriel said, and Chuck sighed.

"Do you know how worried I've been? I asked you to call me every hour and you said sure and then you didn't! I thought you you got eaten by werewolves!"

"Well, I didn't, and that's what's important, right? Anyway, this is my exit. Be home soon, gotta go, love you, bye."

He hit the 'end call' button on his phone and slowly exhaled. Castiel snickered.

"Oh, shut up, Castiel," Gabriel muttered.

* * *

Chuck was more irritated than he was mad, which was good news for Gabriel. He also wanted to restart Gabriel's workout regime, which was not good news for Gabriel. In the past few weeks he hadn't been going for his daily run or doing any of the push-ups, sit-ups, etc. that he was supposed to be doing, which meant that he was incredibly out of shape. The fact that he'd almost bled to death and had been underweight to begin with didn't really help matters.

But Chuck was adamant.

"Oh, there's no way I'm letting you hunt again," he said when Gabriel asked about it. "But I still want you to be in shape. Not only might it help you if you're ever pitted against something you'll need to fight to get away from, but it's good for your health."

So, Gabriel scowled, grumbled, and complained, but there was no changing Chuck's mind. And that was how he found himself puffing along behind his father the next day at seven o'clock in the morning, when the sun was out enough that it wasn't cold, but not so much that it was unbearably hot.

Chuck took pity on him and let him run one mile instead of two, but it still took him eleven and a half minutes, which was a far cry from the six-minute-miles he used to be able to run. He wheezed his way through half an hour of core and upper body exercises, and then he was given another half hour to rest before he faced Chuck for a quick round of sparring.

He got his ass handed to him on a silver platter.

Sam thought the whole thing was hilarious. He was a constant presence in the back of Gabriel's mind, and offered unhelpful comments the entire time Gabriel was struggling through his workout. But Gabriel was glad that he could make his mate laugh, even if it was at his own expense. Sam's laugh never failed to bring a smile to his own face, and he made a silent promise to himself to be the cause of that laugh as much as was physically possible.

They finished just before one in the afternoon and by the time Gabriel came downstairs after taking a quick shower, Chuck was straining a pot of spaghetti. Meatballs sat in another pot of sauce on the stove, and the toaster oven dinged, announcing that the garlic bread was done.

"So," Chuck waid after they'd gotten their food and sat down to eat. "You're going back to school tomorrow?"

Gabriel grimaced. "I'm going to have so much work to make up," he groaned. "I missed too many days to just be able to get the notes from someone in my class."

 _We can get you a tutor,_ Sam said suddenly. _You can just finish the rest of this year at home. Or the rest of high school, if you'd prefer._

 _A tutor, huh?_ Gabriel said.

 _Yeah. That's what Jo's doing right now. She didn't want to go to public school, so Dad hired a tutor for her. He can get one for you, too, if you want._

"Are you talking to Sam?" Chuck asked suddenly, startling Gabriel back to reality.

"How could you tell?" Gabriel asked, spearing a meatball on the end of his fork.

"You got this really focused look on your face," Chuck explained, "and I figured that you were either talking to Sam through your weird mind link thing, or you were attempting to use the force and move the salt shaker with your mind. It wasn't hard to figure out which. So, what did he say?"

"He says that his dad can hire a tutor for me so that I don't have to go back to school."

Chuck thoughtfully twirled a few noodles around his fork. "For how long? Until you got caught up?"

"The rest of high school, if I want," Gabriel said, and Chuck's eyebrows raised in surprise.

"Well, that's nice of them. I know tutors aren't cheap."

 _Don't worry about the money,_ Sam said. _The pack has more than enough to cover the cost._

"Sam says that money's no issue," Gabriel reported. "And, trust me, it probably isn't. You should see his house - damn, I should have taken a picture."

"I'm sure I'll see it eventually," Chuck said. "And if you really don't want to go to school, then fine, you can have a tutor. But only if they come to our place. I don't want you spending more time than necessary surrounded by werewolves."

Gabriel sighed. "Dad, they don't hunt people," he said with the air of someone who'd repeated themselves hundreds of times already, which he had. "They're not like the mindless wolves that you go after. They can control their wolves."

"I know, I know," Chuck said, waving his fork dismissively. The wad of noodles hanging off of it threatened to fly off and hit Gabriel in the face, so he subtly prepared himself to jump out of the way if that happened. "It's just a little hard for me to trust something that I'd been taught was nothing but a mindless killer - on the full moon, at least."

Gabriel bristled angrily and he felt a surge of need to protect Sam's reputation, even to his father. Especially to his father. With some difficulty, he pushed the urge down and focused on eating. Chuck must have sensed his shift in mood, because he didn't say anything else as they ate.

 _Are you okay?_ Sam asked. He must have sensed Gabriel's sudden flare of anger. Gabriel would really have to start working on that mental wall that Sam had told him about in the hospital.

 _I'm fine,_ Gabriel said. _Just unnecessarily and unjustifiably angry._

 _That would be your wolf,_ said Sam. _Male Greys are naturally incredibly protective, possessive, and territorial, much more so than humans can comprehend. Your wolf is still mostly dormant, but meeting me must have awakened him enough for some of the Greys' habits to come through._

 _So, if the wolf is active enough for his emotions to bleed into my actions, how come I can't phase? 'Cause that would be cool as hell._

Sam chuckled, which made Gabriel grin.

 _Your human side is too strong for your wolf to overcome. We don't know for sure how much Grey blood you have in you, but I think it's safe to say it's not a lot, otherwise your wolf would be a lot stronger._

Gabriel chewed thoughtfully on a bite of meatball.

 _That sucks,_ he said finally. _I would've loved to terrorize the people at the dog park._

Sam laughed and Gabriel couldn't help but smile. Chuck, thinking that Gabriel was smiling at him, smiled confusedly back, and Gabriel didn't bother correcting him. He wasn't irritated or angry anymore. It was honestly amazing how calming it was for his wolf - and wasn't that weird, him having a werewolf inside of him? - to simply hear from Sam.

Gabriel finished eating before Chuck did, and he got up to put his bowl in the sink. As he stood, he felt a sharp twinge of pain in his side. He inhaled sharply and his hand flew to his side reflexively. Chuck gave him a concerned look.

"You okay?" he asked.

"Fine," Gabriel answered. "I probably just ate too fast or something."

He ignored the cramps as he rinsed off his dirty dishes and then climbed the stairs to his room.

 _Hey, Sam, I think I'll take you up on that offer. I definitely don't want to go back to school tomorrow,_ he said.

 _Alright, I'll tell Dad. He can get a tutor for Cas, too, if he wants, so you don't have to be separated. I know how much you two would hate that,_ Sam replied, and Gabriel felt a rush of affection towards his thoughtful mate.

When he got to his room, he stripped off his sweatpants and fell into bed in nothing but his boxers and a t-shirt. His body was exhausted from all the physical exertion that Chuck had demanded earlier, and he wanted nothing more than to sleep, but it was much too early for sleep to come.

He ended up spending all day in his room, idly scrolling through the apps on his phone and laptop, trying to finish the book he'd started a little while prior, and willing the day to go faster. He would've asked Sam to come over, but he could fell through the Bond he shared with Sam that the werewolf was busy doing… something. But it felt important, so Gabriel didn't want to disturb him.

The hours passed - slowly, but they passed nonetheless - and Gabriel eventually managed to fall asleep. He wasn't sure how, but when he closed his eyes it was around ten o'clock at night, and when he opened them again it was closer to one in the morning. He was surprised that he had actually fallen asleep so early; he must have been more tired than he'd thought. But if that was true, then why had he woken up for no reason?

 _That would be me,_ Sam said in his mind. _I missed you, and we didn't get to see each other today. You have no idea how much my wolf has been pining for you._

 _You know I do,_ Gabriel said softly. _I have a wolf, too, you know, and mine might be dormant or whatever, but that doesn't mean I didn't miss you as much as you missed me._

 _I know,_ Sam sighed, and Gabriel could feel that he did. _So, can I come in now, or…?_

Gabriel frowned. _Come in?_ he repeated. _Are you outside my house?_

Sam didn't answer, but from outside his window came a short bark. When he opened it, he looked down into his backyard and laughed when he saw Sam in his wolf form standing underneath the tree. Sam's tail started to wag, and he whined up at Gabriel.

"Shh!" Gabriel said. "My dad will hear you. Stay there, I'm coming down."

Sam woofed softly, and Gabriel quickly pulled on a jacket and snuck downstairs. As he passed Chuck's room, he stopped and listened to make sure that his father was asleep. When he was sure that he was, he continued downstairs and padded barefoot over to the backdoor.

He shivered when the cool air hit him after he opened the door, and wished that he'd thought to put on a pair of pants before leaving his room.

"Sam?" he called softly. Sam silently padded over to him, a bundle of clothes clutched tight in his jaws. Gabriel let his eyes wander over his mate, taking in every detail. The only other time he'd seen Sam in his wolf form was when he'd gone on that disastrous vampire hunt, and it wasn't like he was actually conscious enough to remember anything.

The first thing he noticed was the size. Sam was fucking huge. His head came up to Gabriel's shoulder, and his ears added another six inches or so. His head alone probably weighed more than Gabriel, and Sam's paws looked like they could cover his entire face.

His fur was the same rich brown that his hair was, and just as shaggy. It was lighter around his muzzle and his underbelly, and darker on his shoulders and hackles. His eyes were still hazel, though now they were leaning more towards the green side of the spectrum.

All in all, he was a beautiful wolf. Sam must have picked up on his thoughts, because he made a strange rumbling sound and puffed out his chest.

"Did you just purr?" Gabriel whispered, laughing. Sam's ears flattened.

 _Wolves do not purr,_ he said. _They rumble._

"Oh, well, excuse me. You're huge, you know."

 _Was that an innuendo?_ Sam asked.

"Of course it was. Have you met me?" Gabriel couldn't keep the smile off his face. "Come on, let's go upstairs. It's freezing down here and I forgot pants." Sam looked down and noticed, apparently for the first time, that he was bare-legged.

 _Oh, don't put yourself out on my account. I don't mind. Trust me._

If wolves could leer, Gabriel was pretty sure that Sam would be. Gabriel huffed out a quiet laugh and closed the door.

"Come on, you horny mutt," he said fondly, leading the way upstairs. They tiptoed past Chuck's room, and then they were in Gabriel's bedroom. He closed the door and turned to find Sam sitting on his bed, tail thumping rhythmically against the duvet. "You don't shed, do you?" Gabriel asked apprehensively.

Sam let out a whining growl, and he looked offended.

 _Of course not!_ he said. Gabriel held up his hands placatingly and moved to sit next to Sam. He barely came up to Sam's shoulder when they were both sitting a feeling he was, unfortunately, familiar with. Sam huffed out a laugh; no doubt he'd been snooping around in Gabriel's thoughts and had heard the comment.

 _I was not snooping,_ Sam said. _I just happened to hear what you said. You don't think very quietly, you know._

Gabriel pouted and shifted so that he was leaning against his headboard. He tried to imagine a wall between his mind and Sam's, and just like he could see the golden thread that was their Bond, he could see this, too. It was less of a wall and more of a fence, but it was still tall and sturdy and it successfully kept Sam from hearing his thoughts, so Gabriel didn't really care.

Sam whined. _That was mean,_ he said sulkily.

Gabriel shrugged, grinning. "I just wanted to see if I could do it," he said, but he still dropped the shield because though he liked knowing that he could keep Sam out of his head if he ever wanted to surprise him, he didn't like knowing that he'd upset his mate, no matter how small the upset was.

Sam slowly let himself sink onto his belly and rested his head between his paws. Gabriel somehow ended up sprawled half on Sam's back, and it wasn't uncomfortable, so he didn't move.

 _So,_ he said. _What's been going on with your pack?_

Our _pack,_ Sam corrected. _You're part of the pack now, Gabriel, and if I end up becoming Alpha and leading them, then you will, too._

 _No pressure or anything, huh?_ he remarked. He glanced at his clock. It was twelve forty five. _My sleeping schedule is gonna be such shit. I'm going to have to deprive myself of sleep tomorrow to get it back to normal if I don't go back to sleep soon._

 _Go to sleep, then,_ Sam said. Gabriel huffed and moved so that he was curled up into Sam's side. Sam rumbled happily again, making Gabriel smile.

 _No way. I want to stay up with you. I haven't seen you in forever._

 _Gabriel, we saw each other yesterday,_ Sam pointed out. Gabriel shrugged.

 _Still too long, in my opinion. And you never answered my question._

 _The pack is fine. Bobby's in charge of training the younger wolves-_

 _So, you and Dean?_ Gabriel interrupted. Sam huffed.

 _I was talking about Charlie and Jo…. but, yes, also me and Dean. Anyway, Bobby's the Beta, so it's his duty to make sure that the younger wolves can defend themselves. I think he's getting tired of it, honestly. Ash and Jo have been making his life hell lately._

 _The fighting is finally getting to him?_ Gabriel questioned.

 _We all wish it was fighting. They're a force to be reckoned with when they work together to annoy someone. It doesn't help that Bobby was having trouble training Jo before because he sees her as his daughter._

 _What does that have to do with anything?_

 _His wolf won't let him hurt her in any way, shape, or form,_ Sam explained. _Even if it's for her own good. When she first started learning to fight, we had to have Rufus teach her._

 _Yikes,_ Gabriel said, yawning. _Can you shift back to human? Not that I don't love your wolf form, because I do, but I don't think you'll fit underneath my duvet._

Sam motioned for Gabriel to move back, and when the smaller male was leaning leaning against his headboard, he phased. The process was fast, much too fast for the naked eye to capture every stage, but Gabriel got a vague impression of dark fur melting into tanned skin, of paws elongating and separating, and then there was a very naked Sam sitting on his bed.

Sam blushed almost immediately, and he quickly bunched up Gabriel's duvet to cover himself with. Gabriel snorted at his mate's shyness. He didn't know what Sam had to be shy about. He was fucking gorgeous, and it's not like Gabriel's never seen another dude's penis before. He did go to a public school, after all, and the locker rooms weren't the best place for privacy. And he'd changed in front of Castiel before, of course, multiple times.

Sam growled suddenly, his previous shyness forgotten as his eyes start to glow, his canines extended, and his nails sharpened into claws. Gabriel raised his eyebrows in surprise.

"Sam?" he said carefully, unsure of what he'd done to warrant Sam's reaction. The wolf was coming out, and that was never a good thing. Sam didn't respond, but Gabriel figured that was more because it was hard to talk with two enormous canines in his mouth than anything else.

 _Sam?_

Sam closed his eyes and took in a deep breath, obviously trying to calm himself down.

 _Sorry,_ he said, voice strained, even in Gabriel's mind. _But you were thinking about seeing other males' penises, and male Greys get jealous very easily…_

Gabriel blinked when he realized the problem. He grinned and crawled forward until he was sitting cross-legged right in front of Sam.

 _Don't worry, Samshine. You have nothing to be jealous about. I'm sure that no one else's penis can even hold a candle to the monster you're no doubt hiding down there._ Sam didn't respond, and Gabriel frowned at the lack of reaction. He knew that touch would help bring Sam back in control, so he reached up and put his hands on the werewolf's cheeks, and Sam leaned into his touch and took a deep breath.

"Sam Winchester, did you just sniff me?" he laughed. Sam nuzzled Gabriel's palm, his chest rumbling "If you weren't a werewolf and if I wasn't a werewolf, I'd probably flick you for that."

 _Oh, really?_

"Yes, really." Gabriel moved his hands to Sam's neck and leaned forward so that their foreheads were touching. He closed his eyes and just enjoyed being close to his mate.

 _Personal space is all a werewolf-human hybrid has,_ he finished telepathically, and Sam chuckled.

"Of course it is," he whispered out loud, opening his eyes, and Gabriel was glad to see that his eyes were back to their normal hazel colour. _Thank you._

 _Anytime, puppy dog,_ Gabriel replied cheekily.

 _I'm not a dog,_ Sam grumbled. _I'm a wolf._

He sounded so disgruntled that Gabriel couldn't help but laugh (quietly, because Chuck was still sleeping). He muffled the sound into Sam's shoulder, and when he finally took a deep breath and calmed down and leaned back, he was surprised - or maybe not - to find that he still had his arms wrapped around Sam's neck and was practically sitting on his lap.

He and Sam locked eyes and Gabriel let out a tiny exhale. He had no idea how the Great Luna determined who became mates, but he was so, so thankful that he'd ended up as Sam's.

"Me, too, Gabe," Sam whispered. He licked his lips and Gabriel's eyes darted down to follow the movement. He looked back up into Sam's eyes, and the corner of his mouth twitched upwards when he noticed that the wolf's eyes were glowing green.

Slowly, he leaned upwards, until his chest was pressed to Sam's and their lips were barely touching.

"I love you, Sam Winchester," he breathed out, their lips brushing ever so slightly. Sam closed his eyes and shivered, and Gabriel smirked. Gently, he closed his own eyes and pushed himself up the extra millimeter that it would take to press their lips together fully.

Sam's lips were soft and slightly chapped and warm, and Gabriel tilted his head back to get a better angle. Sam's hands moved from his lap and came to rest lightly around Gabriel's waist, but they began to tighten when Gabriel poked out his tongue and licked at Sam's bottom lip.

Sam took this as an invitation and his tongue snuck out and met Gabriel's. Gabriel moaned quietly and he could feel Sam's amusement through their Bond. He growled and licked into Sam's mouth in retaliation, and Sam let out a small whine. Gabriel nipped at Sam's bottom lip, but soothed it immediately with his tongue, and Sam shivered again.

Gabriel crawled completely into Sam's lap and straddled his thighs. His hands came up and ran through the larger male's hair, tugging gently. Sam moaned, the sound reverberating from deep within his chest and into Gabriel's, and so the smaller male did it again, harder.

Sam growled, and it was nothing like the sound Gabriel had made earlier. This was something completely animalistic, something filled with need. He ran his hands up Gabriel's back and over his shoulders, onto his chest. His thumbs ran in tiny circles around Gabriel's nipples, making him shiver and moan.

Sam's mouth left Gabriel's and started moving downwards, leaving a trail of open-mouthed kisses and scorching skin across his jaw and down his throat. Gabriel hissed with pleasure as Sam sucked lightly on the sensitive skin just behind his ear. His whole body felt like it was on fire, everywhere from the tips of his toes to the top of his head. His skin was too hot, and it was scorching where it came into contact with Sam, which was practically everywhere.

'Little Gabriel' had decided to come out, and so had 'Little Sam', if Sam's arousal through the Bond was any indicator. The only thing separating their erections were the thin layer of fabric that were Gabriel's boxers and the duvet, and Gabriel pressed down, trying to get at least a little friction. But just as things were getting interesting, Sam pulled back. Gabriel whined in protest at the loss, but Sam put a finger to his lips to shush him.

 _Your dad is waking up,_ he said urgently, and Gabriel's eyes widened.

 _Oh, shit. What do we do?_

 _We be quiet and wait for him to go back to sleep,_ Sam replied. They sat silently, not even daring to move, for a good ten minutes, until they were sure that Chuck was fast asleep again. By then, their bodies had calmed down again, and Gabriel was sitting comfortably in Sam's lap with his head on the werewolf's shoulder.

"Tired?" Sam whispered. Gabriel hummed an affirmative, too sleepy to even form words. "Want to go to sleep?"

 _Obviously,_ Gabriel muttered, and Sam chuckled quietly.

 _Move, then, so I can get up._

 _Are you going to go back home?_

 _I was planning on staying over here,_ Sam said. _If that's okay with you, that is._

 _Of course it's okay with me._

Gabriel still didn't move, and Sam was eventually forced to (gently) push him onto the bed so that he could get up. It was a testament to just how sleepy Gabriel actually was that he didn't move his head to try and get a view of Sam as he shimmied into his boxers and then a pair of sweatpants.

A few moments later, the bed dipped as Sam crawled up to where Gabriel was curled up around his pillow near the headboard. Sam maneuvered them so that they were more or less under the duvet with their heads on the pillows.

 _Good night, Sam,_ Gabriel murmured. _And I meant what I said earlier. I love you, so much._

Sam's breath caught in his throat for a second, and then their Bond was flooded with happiness

 _I love you, too, Gabriel._


	12. Chapter 12

Gabriel was not a still sleeper. He was constantly moving around at night, tossing and turning and changing positions. But for some reason, he found himself unable to turn over in the morning when he woke up. Something heavy was pinning him down, and he frowned as he cracked open his eyes to find out what it was.

He looked in confusion at the shaggy brown head that was resting on his chest, but then the memories from the previous night came rushing back, and he smiled. Sam must have moved in his sleep, because Gabriel knew for a fact that the two of them had fallen asleep lying next to each other.

Moving slowly so as not to wake his mate, Gabriel turned his head and glanced at the clock on his bedside table. The bright red numbers cut through the semidarkness so that he had to squint to make out what they said, but when his eyes adjusted he was surprised to find that it was only six in the morning.

Gabriel frowned. If Sam was going to go to school today, he needed to get up and get ready. _But,_ he thought to himself, _if he's getting me a tutor, there's no way he'd continue to go to public school, so he'd probably be homeschooled with me._ That made sense, so, satisfied with himself, Gabriel closed his eyes and tried to go back to sleep.

At least, until he remembered what had woken him up in the first place. His stomach was cramping up again, and he winced at a particularly sharp stab of pain. Moving only made it worse, so he could do nothing but lay there and hope the pain went away soon.

After a few minutes, it did, so Gabriel sighed and closed his eyes yet again, hoping to get at least another hour or two before he was forced to start his day.

And then Sam woke up, of course, because the universe hated Gabriel and had decided to say to him "Fuck your sleep, Gabriel."

The werewolf shifted, lifted his head up off of Gabriel's chest, and yawned blearily, looking around the room in confusion. His eyes lifted to meet Gabriel's and he smiled, and Gabriel's heart melted at how adorably rumpled Sam looked.

"Morning," he said.

"G'morning," Sam replied groggily. "What time is it?"

"A little after six," said Gabriel. "Way too early to be up, in my opinion."

The last part was muttered, but Sam still chuckled, no doubt using his freaky werewolf superpowers to hear him.

"They're not superpowers," said Sam. "I just have better hearing than humans."

"And better vision, and endurance, and strength, and sense of smell, and you can see in the dark, and you can turn into a giant fucking wolf," Gabriel pointed out, eyebrows raised. "Like I said: superpowers."

Sam huffed. "Whatever you say, Gabe," he said. "Hey, can I borrow a toothbrush? I forgot to bring mine."

Gabriel groaned. "But then I'd have to get up," he whined. "You wouldn't displace me from my extremely comfortable nest of blankets, would you?" He curled up into a ball and gave Sam his best puppy dog eyes. Sam glared at him, but it was half-hearted.

"You're lucky you're cute," he said. He got up and raised his arms above his head in a huge stretch, and Gabriel couldn't help how his gaze raked over the flexing muscles in Sam's back. The werewolf must have heard his thoughts, because he turned around and smirked at Gabriel. "Fine. If you won't give me a toothbrush, I'll have to go find one myself."

"Knock yourself out," Gabriel said. "But we rarely have extras because Dad never goes to- shit! How are you supposed to get out of the house? If Dad finds you here, he's going to kill me!"

Sam rolled his eyes fondly. "He won't kill you. He might kill _me_ , but not you."

"I'd rather not have to go to a funeral anytime soon, Sam, whether it's mine or yours," Gabriel hissed. "The original point still stands."

"Calm down, Gabe. I'll just jump out the window and then ring the doorbell. He'll just think I got up really early and came over to see you. Or something."

Gabriel looked at Sam like he was crazy, which the former was beginning to suspect was the case. "You're going to jump out of my second story window and then try to convince my father that you ran to my house at six in the morning with no shirt or shoes on just to say 'hi'?" he asked incredulously. Sam shifted.

"Well, when you put it like that," he muttered.

"But," Gabriel murmured, "it's not like you can just waltz half naked out of my room like we'd spent the night going at it like rabbits. All right, fine." He waved a dismissive hand. "Jump out of my window. I'll go find you a toothbrush."

He watched as Sam moved to open the window, but turned away before he had to watch Sam casually step out of it. Something inside of him was urging him to go and grab Sam, to not let him do anything even remotely dangerous, but the other part forcefully told that first part that jumping was practically second nature to Greys and that Sam would be fine.

He reached for the doorknob and turned it, just as he heard the _thump!_ that was probably Sam landing in his backyard, and then a loud yelp that sounded suspiciously like Chuck, a crash, and a spiel of curse words so bad that even Gabriel winced when he heard them.

But then his brain actually processed what he'd just heard and _holy shit did Sam land on Dad?!_ became the only thought he was capable of creating as he ran out of his room, down the stairs, and over to the back door.

Luckily, he didn't find any unconscious or dead bodies underneath his window, but he did pause and his eyes widened in horror when he took in the scene before him. Chuck was standing next to the back door, his robe undone and his hair a mess. At his feet was a huge brown puddle and a few shards of what Gabriel assumed used to be a mug. Chuck himself had coffee splatters all over his pajama pants, and he was yelling at Sam, who was standing outside with his head slightly bowed. Gabriel grimaced and decided to stay hidden at the bottom of the stairs for the moment.

"-the actual fuck were you doing in my house last night?!" Chuck demanded angrily. "And why the everliving fuck would you decide to jump out of the window?! The neighbors could have seen you, for fucks sake! And you could have killed yourself!"

Sam opened his mouth, probably to inform Chuck that he wouldn't have gotten hurt, but Gabriel stopped him.

 _I wouldn't say anything if I were you,_ he said. _Dad rarely gets this angry, so it's best to let him get it out of his system._

 _How long have you been standing there?_ Sam asked. _And do you maybe want to come help me?_

 _Nah,_ Gabriel said, a wide grin on his face. _I'll let him know that I let you into the house after he's calmed down. Maybe._

"And why the fuck were you in Gabriel's room?" Chuck gestured wildly with his arms, and he narrowly avoided smacking Sam in the face. "Look, I get that you guys are soulmates or whatever, but you can't just stare at him while he's sleeping. That's creepy as fuck."

Deciding that Sam could handle this for now, Gabriel turned to go back upstairs and put on a pair of pants. But before he could even get past the first step, a sharp pain stabbed through his stomach, and he stopped on the bottom step, doubling over slightly. The cramps were back. Lovely.

 _Gabe, you okay?_ Sam asked. Gabriel tried to straighten up, but found that he couldn't. Instead, he sunk down until he was sitting on the step with both of his arms around his stomach.

 _Fine,_ he said. _It's just a cramp or something. It'll pass._

 _Are you sure?_

 _Totally. I probably just slept in a weird position or something._

He could feel a bit of guilt from Sam's end of the Bond, and he remembered that Sam had used him as a pillow last night.

 _Relax, Sammy, it's not your fault,_ he reassured his mate.

"-and if you ever do something so stupid and, frankly, rude, again, I will neuter you," Chuck said. "Now get inside. I assume you haven't eaten anything yet. Do you want breakfast? Are pancakes and eggs okay?"

"Uh, yeah," Sam said, confusion evident in his voice. "Thanks."

Chuck rolled his eyes. "Go find a shirt or a blanket or something and then come clean up the mess that used to be my coffee."

He walked into the kitchen, his slippers crunching over the broken mug. Sam carefully stepped around the pile and made a beeline for Gabriel.

"Are you okay?" he asked quietly, kneeling down so that they were eye-to-eye.

"I'm fine, Sam," Gabriel said. The pain faded to a dull ache, and he stood up, smiling triumphantly. "See?"

Sam didn't look convinced, but he let it go for now. "Do you have shirt I could borrow?" he asked.

Gabriel looked at Sam, then at himself, then back at Sam. "I don't think anything I have would fit you," he said honestly. "In case you haven't noticed, you're a lot bigger than me. Innuendo totally intended," he added with a wink. Sam rolled his eyes fondly.

"Why is everything about sex with you?" he asked.

"Because it can and because sex is amazing," Gabriel answered honestly, turning and starting up the stairs. Sam growled. "Oh, shut up, it was one time, and that was before I ever met you."

"Not really helping," Sam said, his voice gravelly and distorted, and Gabriel turned to find it was because his canines had descended. He stopped in the middle of the stairs and wrapped his arm around Sam's waist, resting his head on the taller boy's shoulder.

"Sorry," he said softly. They stayed like that for a few moments, until Sam had gotten control of his wolf. Gabriel ran up the stairs, pulled on a pair of sweatpants, grabbed the oversized hoodie he'd gotten as a birthday present from his Aunt Amara a year ago, and then returned to find Sam carefully picking up the pieces of the mug Chuck had dropped.

While Chuck was rummaging through the fridge for eggs, Gabriel grabbed a wad of paper towels and then knelt down next to his mate to soak up the cold coffee. When the mess was all cleaned up, he handed Sam the hoodie. It was really big on Gabriel, but it was still small on Sam. It was tight across the chest and shoulders and the sleeves ended halfway up his forearms, but a bit of his stomach showed every time he moved his arms, so Gabriel wasn't complaining.

"Hey, Dad," he said when he went into the kitchen to throw away his wad of wet paper towels. Chuck was standing at the stove, making breakfast.

"Morning, Gabriel," he said. "Sam's here."

"I noticed," Gabriel said, deciding to play along. "When did he get here?"

"Last night, apparently." Chuck made a face as he poured more batter into the pan.

"That's not creepy at all," Gabriel said, grinning.

 _Thanks for having my back, Gabe,_ Sam said. The werewolf walked into the kitchen then, and came up to stand behind Gabriel.

 _No problem,_ Gabriel replied cheekily.

"So, I take it you aren't going to school," Chuck asked as he scrambled a few eggs. "Any plans for today?"

"Not really," Gabriel said. "Unless there's something you want to do?" he added, turning to Sam.

"I'm down for whatever," said Sam. Chuck nodded and transferred a pancake onto a plate.

"Well, I don't have anything to do today, so I'll be here, I guess." His phone started to ring, and he fished it out of his pocket and checked who was calling. "Oh, I spoke too soon," he sighed.

"Who is it?" Gabriel asked.

"Becky," Chuck grumbled. Then he accepted the call and pasted a falsely cheerful smile on his face. "Becky! What's up?" Gabriel couldn't make out what Becky said, but the smile dropped off Chuck's face and his eyes widened. "What? Who is it?... Do you know what attacked him?"

After Becky replied, Chuck cast a not-so-surreptitious glance at Sam, and Gabriel felt his stomach tighten in a way that had nothing to do with his stomach ache.

"You think they're connected?" Chuck continued. He walked away from the stove, and Gabriel quickly took his place so nothing would burn. "Okay. Okay. No, I'm not busy today. Yeah, I'll be right over. Yeah, no problem. Bye"

He ended the call and turned to give Sam and Gabriel a fleeting frown before hastily exiting the kitchen and starting up the stairs. Gabriel exchanged one look with Sam, who shrugged, before following his father.

 _Watch the stove?_ he said.

 _Sure,_ Sam replied.

When Gabriel reached Chuck's room, it was to find the man frantically rushing around, obviously trying to multitask. He was throwing clothes into a duffel bag that was sitting on his bed and trying to change out of his pajamas at the same time.

"Dad?" Gabriel called from where he was standing in the doorway. Chuck paused with his t-shirt half off and his hand buried inside the duffel, still clutching a pair of jeans that he'd put inside it. "Is everything okay?"

"Yes," Chuck said. "I mean, no! I mean… kind of?" He pulled the shirt all the way off and replaced it with a plain black one.

"Dad, what's going on?" Gabriel asked. Chuck zipped up the duffel and sat on the edge of his bed, one hand running through his hair.

He sighed and looked up at Gabriel, who was getting more and more worried by the second.

 _I'm sure it's fine, Gabe,_ Sam said, and through the Bond. Gabriel got the feeling of Sam's hand running down his cheek. _It's probably just some supes terrorizing a town somewhere._

 _You're probably right,_ Gabriel sighed. _Thanks, Sammy._

"Do you remember a few weeks ago," Chuck said, "when I left for a hunt just before you decided to go after three vampires on your own?"

"I thought it was only one," Gabriel muttered. "Yeah," he added, a little louder. "You didn't want to go but Becky made you because no other hunter was responding."

"Right. Well, Becky just called me to let me know that she found one of the hunters who she'd tried to contact back then."

"Where'd she find them?" Gabriel asked.

Chuck sighed again. "She found him locked in a basement next to the dead body of his hunting partner."

Gabriel's eyes widened. "Shit," he breathed, and Chuck didn't even reprimand him for his language. "What happened?"

"Tortured for info, apparently," said Chuck. "He was too out of it to answer any of Becky's questions, but he did mention werewolves."

Gabriel's heart skipped a beat and fear pooled in his stomach.

"Werewolves?" he repeated in a tiny voice.

 _It can't be Greys,_ Sam said, sounding as panicky as Gabriel felt. _No Grey would ever hurt a human. It has to have been a Hokkaido wolf._

 _But would a Hokkaido even be in control of themselves enough to kidnap and torture, but not kill and eat, a human? And what about after the full moon was over? There's no way whoever lived in that house wouldn't notice people being held in their basement, or the blood._

Sam was silent.

"Dad, there's no way a Grey wolf would do something like this," Gabriel said a little desperately and despite what he had just said to Sam.

"I know, Gabriel," said Chuck reassuringly. He lifted up the bag and started down the stairs, Gabriel following along behind him. "Despite what I say about Sam, I know he and his kind aren't actually evil. I did pay attention when John explained all this stuff to us, you know."

Gabriel let a tiny smile lift up the corners of his mouth as he was filled with a rush of affection for his father. He felt his anxiety diminish and his heart slow down until it was beating at a normal rate.

"So…?" he said.

"So," said Chuck, "I still have to go and check it out. Becky thinks that whatever kidnapped this hunter could be behind the disappearances of all the others who used to live around here."

"Makes sense," said Gabriel. They entered the kitchen, where Sam was standing next to the stove with a small frown on his face. He looked up when Gabriel and Chuck walked in, and Gabriel could see and feel his distress. Wordlessly, he opened his arms and Sam came to him immediately, almost crushing Gabriel in a hug. Gabriel squeezed back just as tight. "Everything'll work out, Sammy," he whispered, knowing that Sam's werewolf hearing would allow him to catch it.

They only pulled apart when Chuck quietly cleared his throat.

"I don't know how long I'll be gone," he said, his eyes flicking back and forth between the two teens. "But you're welcome to stay here until I get back, Sam. And, Gabriel, if you want to stay with the Winchesters, that's fine, too."

"Okay. Thanks, Dad," Gabriel said, shooting his father a grateful smile and giving him a hug. He remembered what happened the last time one of them went on a hunt, and though he knew that his father was more than capable of handling himself, he still worried. This could be the last time they ever saw each other, and so Gabriel allowed himself to hold on just a little longer than he normally did when he hugged his father.

And then, far too soon, they pulled away and gave each other small, comforting smiles.

Less than ten minutes later, Chuck was gone and Sam and Gabriel were seated at the table with a huge plate of pancakes, and another piled high with scrambled eggs, in front of them. Sam was actually a pretty good cook, and Gabriel closed his eyes in pleasure when he took the first bite of his pancake.

"This is really good," he said to Sam, voice slightly muffled.

"Thanks," Sam mumbled, sounding distracted. Gabriel looked at him, noticing how he was poking at his food but not actually eating it and the glazed look in his eyes. He tried using the Bond to determine what was wrong, but Sam had put up a wall and was keeping him out. Gabriel frowned at the thought of his mate pushing him away when he was in distress.

 _Sam?_ he questioned. _Are you okay?_

"I'm fine, Gabriel," Sam said, his gaze flickering up to meet Gabriel's for only a second. Gabriel tried not to feel hurt at the blatant rejection of their mental connection; Sam was obviously upset about something.

"No, you're not," Gabriel said, gently but firmly. "I'm your mate, Sam, and I've known you for months. I can tell when you're hiding something from me. Please let me help."

It must have been the 'please' that did it, for Gabriel never said please. Ever. Sam sighed and the wall between their minds crumbled. Gabriel's eyes narrowed as he sorted through what his mate was feeling.

Fear was there, the fear that Chuck was lying about not thinking a Grey had attacked the hunter, and fear that even if Chuck was telling the truth, he wouldn't be able to convince all the other hunters to not come and attack his pack. There was also anxiety; apparently, Greys harbored the same feelings for a Hokkaido Wolf that a human might feel for a rabid pet dog: pity and fear, but there was also a bit of hatred. Sam didn't want to have to deal with a Hokkaido putting his pack in danger when there were other threats around.

The werewolf's thoughts were a mess of negative emotions, but the one dominating his mind was guilt. He felt guilty for a member of his species - or subspecies, whatever - attacking a human, and he also felt guilty about Chuck going out into danger to deal with it. He felt like his pack should have gotten wind of the wolf, whether it ended up being a Hokkaido or a rogue Grey, and dealt with it.

"Oh, Sam," Gabriel sighed when he was finished. He abandoned his plate and walked around the table to where Sam was sitting, wrapping him up in a huge hug. Sam hugged him back, hard, his arms almost painful from where they were wrapped around Gabriel's waist. "It'll be alright, love. Dad can handle himself, there's no need for you to feel guilty."

"We could have stopped this, prevented this," Sam whispered into Gabriel's shirt.

"No, you couldn't have. It's not your fault that you didn't know there was a werewolf torturing hunters in another state," Gabriel said firmly. "There was nothing you could have done. And, besides, we don't even know for sure what's going on. We don't know for sure if it even is a werewolf; that hunter could have been hallucinating or something."

Gabriel pushed his certainty of Sam's innocence to the front of his mind so that the latter would be able to detect it. He could see and feel the exact moment Sam's mood lifted; his mouth quirked up into a tiny, grateful smile, and the Bond let Gabriel feel his relief and newfound optimism.

"Thanks, Gabe," Sam sighed, tightening his arms once before letting go. As always when he touched Sam, Gabriel felt just the tiniest bit of disappointment at the lost contact, but he hid it well. Instead of throwing himself back into Sam's arms like he wanted to, he sat down in the seat next to Sam's and was content with letting their shoulders touch as they finished eating.

"So," he said ten minutes later when they were rinsing their plates off in the sink, "what do you want to do today?"

Sam shrugged. "I don't really care, as long as it's with you," he said honestly.

"Sap," Gabriel teased, though they both knew that he secretly loved it. "But seriously, do you want to go see a movie? Or we could go to the park and just hang out, or we could stay here."

"I really don't care," Sam said again. "Although I am pretty partial to anything that involves leaving the house."

"Okay, so park?" asked Gabriel, who didn't really feel like having to deal with people but wanted to get out of the house.

"Park," Sam agreed. "But not now. It's a little early to go prancing through the park, isn't it?"

Gabriel snorted and led the way to the couch. "I don't prance, Samshine."

"Are you sure about that?" Sam teased. "Because I could have sworn that you pranced down the steps last night when you came to open the door for me."

"Nope," Gabriel said, popping the 'p'. "I have never pranced in my life."

"Now that can't be true. There's no way for you to know what you did before a certain age, and I'm sure you don't remember every day of your entire life."

"Are you calling me a liar?" Gabriel asked, his hand flying to cover his heart in mock outrage.

"I'm not calling you a truther," Sam replied, grinning. Gabriel laughed and leaned over Sam's lap to grab the remote. He could have just asked, but, well. This was was more fun, especially when Sam fidgeted underneath him.

Grinning smugly, Gabriel retreated and sat back on the couch. He turned on the TV and started idly flicking through the channels, looking for something good. There wasn't anything on at six thirty in the morning, so he finally settled on a _Spongebob_ rerun and turned his attention to Sam.

"So," he said.

"So," Sam repeated.

"Dad won't be back for a while." Gabriel grinned and waggled his eyebrows suggestively, which made Sam let out a tiny laugh.

"Oh, really?"

"Yes, really."

"And why is this relevant now?" Sam asked, feigning indifference. Quick as a flash, Gabriel plopped himself down on Sam's lap and leaned forward until their lips brushed when he spoke.

"Why _isn't_ this relevant now?" he asked, licking his lips. Sam's eyes tracked the movement and then snapped up to meet his. Gabriel was pleased to see that the pupils were larger than they'd been just a moment ago.

"That doesn't even make sense," Sam said, though he sounded distracted. It was probably because Gabriel was pressing a trail of kisses across his jaw and down his throat, but, oh well.

"Are you sure it doesn't?" Gabriel asked, shifting in Sam's lap slightly. He nipped at Sam's pulse point at the same time, and was rewarded when the werewolf gave a full body twitch in response.

"Ah," Sam said, sounding like he was trying to focus. "I, um… what?"

Gabriel grinned wickedly and continued his ministrations, going lower and lower until he had to push aside Sam's shirt to get at his collarbones.

And then his phone rang. Of course.

Gabriel sighed harshly and reached back to grab it from the coffee table. He accepted the call without checking the Caller ID and leaned back a little.

"What?" he snapped into the phone. Sam looked a little dazed, and Gabriel felt a flash of disappointment that he'd had to stop what he was doing to answer the phone. He wasn't sure if it was his or Sam's.

"Gabriel, are you coming to school today?" It was Castiel, and he sounded annoyed.

"Oh, shit, no," Gabriel said. "Sorry, Cas."

"Yeah, you'd better be," Castiel mumbled darkly. "Do you want me to take notes for you?"

"Oh, no, it's fine. Sam's getting me a tutor so we can finish high school at home." He looked to Sam questioningly, glad that the wolf was at least coherent enough to respond when he nodded. "He can hire one for you, too, if you'd like. Or we'd have the same tutor, I'm not sure."

"Oh. Really?" Castiel sounded surprised.

"Yup," Gabriel said. "Dad's going to officially pull me out whenever he gets back."

"Gets back? Did he go on another hunt?" Castiel asked, sounding only mildly disapproving. He'd stopped hating Chuck's random departures once he'd found out what the man was actually doing, but that didn't mean that he actually approved of them.

"Sort of," said Gabriel. "He's checking something out."

"Is everything alright?" Castiel asked.

Gabriel hesitated, looking once more to Sam. The werewolf nodded again, smiling sadly. "Not exactly," Gabriel said. "Hunters that used to live around this area have been disappearing, and one of them was found in a basement."

"What happened?"

"He was tortured. He was too out of it to make coherent sentences, but he did mention werewolves." He paused to let the implications sink in.

"Shit," Castiel said. "Is Sam okay? And Dean? Have you talked to either of them yet?"

"Sam's okay, more or less," said Gabriel. "And I haven't talked to Dean since Saturday, but I don't think he even knows."

"Don't tell him until you know for sure what's going on, okay?" Castiel asked, voice tinged with desperation.

Gabriel frowned. "Of course I won't."

"Thank you," Castiel sighed. "I have to go, I'm going to be late."

"Bye, Cas," Gabriel said before hanging up. He placed his phone back on the table and leaned back so that he was reclining against Sam's chest. He sighed.

And his phone rang again.

"Holy shit," Gabriel mumbled as he reached for the phone and answered it. " _What do you want?_ "

There was a pause from whoever was on the other side of the line.

"Dude, is it your time of the month?" Dean. Of fucking course.

"Was that a werewolf pun?" Gabriel asked, eyebrow raised.

"Did you want it to be a werewolf pun?" Dean asked haltingly, which meant that it had been unintentional. Gabriel sighed.

"What do you want, Dean?"

"Have you seen Sam today? He wasn't here when I woke up and there aren't any fresh scents in his room, which means he didn't sleep here last night."

"Yeah, he was with me," Gabriel said.

"Scandalous," Dean said, and Gabriel could practically hear the smirk in his voice. "Did you at least use protection?"

"Is that all you wanted?" Gabriel asked, ignoring the question.

"Yes, jeez, no need to be so pissy."

Oh, yay. Another dog pun.

"Bye, Dean," Gabriel said, hanging up his phone again. This time he put it into silent mode and practically threw it onto the opposite side of the couch. Sam snickered. "This is the only time in my life I've ever not wanted my phone."

"Aw, that's gotta be tough," Sam cooed. Gabriel flicked his arm.

"Sarcasm is not appreciated," he mumbled.

"But you're sarcastic almost all the time," Sam pointed out.

"No, I'm not. Cas is. Besides, I'm the one who said that sarcasm isn't appreciated, so I'm the only one who's allowed to be sarcastic, like how rules don't apply to the people who make them up."

"That's… not how rules work," Sam said. Gabriel shrugged.

"It's close enough, right?"

"It's not, actually."

"Why are you being so incon-rude-erate?"

Sam narrowed his eyes. "Incon-rude-erate?" he repeated. "What is that, a mix of rude and inconsiderate? That's not a word."

"It is now," Gabriel stated. Sam rolled his eyes, but the gesture was fond.

"Whatever, Gabe," he said. There was a short silence, but not an awkward one. Weeks of sitting with each other in the library during lunch had taught them that they didn't need to fill the air with chatter all the time; at least, not when around each other.

"So," Gabriel said after a few moments. "When do you want to go?"

"I don't really care," Sam replied. "I'm not doing anything right now, though."

"What a coincidence, Mr Winchester," Gabriel said with exaggerated surprise. "Neither am I."

"Perfect. Shall we, then?"

"Let's shall."

The two of them pulled themselves off the couch and climbed back up to Gabriel's room. While Sam watched and made suggestive comments, Gabriel changed out of his pajamas and into a pair of jeans, a t-shirt, and his favourite hunter green jacket. He was slipping into his black Converse when Sam stilled.

"What?" Gabriel asked as he tied his laces.

Sam looked down at himself. "I'm not going outside the house like this."

Gabriel raised an eyebrow, raked his eyes up and down the werewolf's form, and then decided that he was right. Sam was still wearing the sweatpants he'd brought with him, but he looked ridiculous in Gabriel's hoodie, and he was still barefoot. And he may have been a werewolf, but even he didn't want to go traipsing around a park (that was more of a woods, actually) without any shoes on.

"Well, crap." Gabriel sat back on his heels as he tried to think of a solution. After a moment, he got an idea and smiled angelically up at his mate.

"I really do not like the look on your face," Sam said warily. His eyes narrowed as he finally detected what Gabriel was thinking, and then he adopted a very disgruntled expression. "Are you serious?"

"Why not?" Gabriel asked. "It's the perfect plan! We get to go out and enjoy this fine, fine Monday together. What's the problem?"

"The problem is that you want me to pretend to be your dog," said Sam. "I'm not a dog! I'm a wolf. There's a difference."

"I know there is," Gabriel said. "But do we have any other options? Unless, of course, you just want to stay here all day or go out looking like an idiot." He could feel just how much Sam wanted to go out, and, truthfully, so did he. The sun was just barely up, but Gabriel could tell that it was going to be a gorgeous day. "And besides, it's not like you have to wear a collar or anything. You just have to walk around in your wolf form. Is that so hard?"

 _Of course,_ he added through their Bond, _you could always put a collar on if that's something that you're into._

Sam snorted, and Gabriel felt a brief moment of relief that his mate wasn't borderline angry at him anymore. That hadn't been fun.

"I wasn't angry, Gabe," Sam assured him. "Just insulted. But, yeah, I can see where you're coming from, and it's not like I haven't spent days at a time as a wolf before."

"So…?"

"So, let's go before the park fills up with actual dogs."


	13. Chapter 13

Sam turned quite a few heads when they eventually made it to the park. He was huge, especially when compared to Gabriel, who wasn't the tallest person in the world to begin with. The people walking along the park's single path stared at them as they passed by, eyebrows furrowed as they tried to figure out what kind of "dog" Sam was.

He was obviously a wolf, which wasn't that unusual; people often bred purebred wolves with huskies, but Sam didn't look like a husky. His fur didn't have white in it, for one, and his face was sharper and more angular than a husky's. He was a predator, and people could sense that, see it in the way he stalked down the sidewalk next to Gabriel, ears flicking at every noise and nose constantly twitching.

"Would you relax?" Gabriel said as they came to a large picnic area in the center of the woods. The clearing was covered in soft green grass and dotted with bright yellow dandelions. At the far edge of the area was a playground and a few picnic tables, but it was mostly open space. "You look like you're going to attack everyone that walks by. That's not very inconspicuous."

 _Inconspicuous like you talking to a wolf-dog?_ Sam replied, voice dry. Gabriel rolled his eyes and reached out to scratch him behind the ears.

 _That's not conspicuous. People talk to their dogs all the time,_ Gabriel said.

 _I'm not a dog, Gabe,_ Sam said reflexively, but he still cocked his head to make it easier for Gabriel's fingers to dig through his thick fur. Gabriel smiled and led them over to a small tree that was slightly separated from the rest of the woods. They settled down in the shade and Gabriel leaned back into Sam's bulk, using him as a backrest. Sam huffed, a hot puff of air landing on Gabriel's hand.

 _Comfortable?_ he asked.

 _Immensely,_ Gabriel replied. His hand found its way to Sam's ears again, and he began absentmindedly scratching behind them. The werewolf rumbled and rolled onto his side, and Gabriel laughed. _Are you sure you're not a dog?_

 _Hey! Just because I enjoy a good belly rub does not mean that I'm a dog._ He lifted his head up so that he could look Gabriel in the eyes. _That was a hint, just in case you didn't get that._

Gabriel sighed dramatically, but he obediently began scratching at Sam's furry belly. The rumbling grew louder and louder, and for a rather long while, they just sat there, Gabriel with his hand buried in soft fur and his mind wandering. It was incredibly relaxing, simply sitting with his mate, enjoying the beautiful day.

And they weren't the only ones out. The playground was crawling with kids of all ages, the grass littered with couples and families who were basking in the warm sunshine. A seemingly never ending stream of people came and went on the path behind them. Lost in his thoughts and people watching, Gabriel didn't even notice time passing until Sam stopped purring. He looked down, surprised to find the wolf fast asleep.

He checked his phone, and his eyebrows rose when he saw that it was already ten in the morning. He'd been sitting there for three hours? But then, shouldn't he be feeling the- and yup, there they were. _Ow holy shit,_ pins and needles stabbed his legs, which he'd been sitting on. Lovely.

Groaning softly so as not to wake up Sam, he stood shakily and tried to stretch his sore muscles. The wolf's ears twitched, but he made no other motion to indicate he would wake up. Gabriel placed his hands on his hips and looked around at the park, trying to figure out what he should do now. He didn't want to wake Sam just because he was bored, he couldn't hang out with Cas or Dean, he couldn't leave the park in case something happened to Sam…

Well, he'd figure something out. First things first, though; he had to pee. Luckily, there was a small cafe not far from the clearing that he knew had a bathroom. After a moment of debating with himself - should he wake Sam and tell him where he was going, should he _not_ wake Sam and just go? - he decided to just go. If Sam woke up before he got back, they could always communicate through their Bond.

Decision made, Gabriel stuck his phone back into his pocket and started walking. The path was surrounded by trees that towered over him, creating the pattern of leaves that dappled the ground. To either side of him was the woods - the woods where he had been stupid and heartbroken enough to go hunting by himself, and he shivered as he recalled the terror that had been coursing through his veins when the two vampires that he hadn't known about had stepped into his line of sight.

He drew his mind away from the memories and walked faster.

Along the way, he passed many different people, and many people were walking behind him, too. If anyone noticed the small amount of tension in his shoulders, no one asked him about it. But it wasn't just the foreboding (even in the sunlight) woods to either side of him that was making him speedwalk; it was his distance from Sam. Gabriel knew that the wolf could take care of himself. But he was currently all alone and fast asleep, and Gabriel's mind sadistically tortured him of visions of all the horrible things that could happen to his mate in his absence.

It was with great relief that, after not even ten minutes of walking, Gabriel reached the cafe. He hurried inside, relieved himself as fast as he could, and then hurried back out, his anxiety growing each minute. He was ready to sprint back to Sam if he had to.

But it didn't seem like he'd have to. He found, when he pushed into Sam's mind, that the wolf was still sleeping, and his dreams were filled with Gabriel and wide open fields of green grass and the amazing feeling of fingers threading through his fur, and for a moment, Gabriel lost himself in it.

But then that moment ended and Gabriel pulled himself out of Sam's dreams, now content that his mate was fine. He started walking down the path at an unhurried pace, ready to actually enjoy the view that the trees made, but he stopped and frowned when he noticed something odd. At the side of the cafe, hidden partially in shadow, was a slumped figure.

Gabriel narrowed his eyes, trying to make out what it was. Slowly, his mind pieced together that it was a body leaning against the side of the cafe. He couldn't tell from this distance if it was alive or dead, so he cautiously walked closer.

The body ended up being a man, and he was still alive, judging by his rapidly heaving chest. He looked terrible, skin glistening with sweat and eyes screwed up with pain. When Gabriel's shadow passed over him, his eyes flew open, flicking around rapidly until they landed on Gabriel. They were unfocused, but his gaze didn't waver.

"Holy crap, what happened to you?" Gabriel exclaimed as he knelt down next to the man.

"Allergies," he wheezed. "Need… EpiPen… in car…"

"Shit, okay, where's your car?" The man lifted a trembling hand and pointed out towards the parking lot next to the cafe, and Gabriel clenched his jaw, determined to help this person. Carefully, he worked his arm underneath both of the man's, then stood slowly. He was taller than Gabriel by a good half a foot at least, and that made it extremely awkward, but they managed to shuffle as quickly as they could towards the man's car.

When they reached the sleek black minivan, the man fumbled around with his hand until he extracted a fob from his pocket. He handed it to Gabriel, who unlocked the car and then carefully deposited the man in the passenger seat, leaving the driver's seat open so that he could drive them to the hospital after he'd finished with injecting the EpiPen.

"Where's is it?" he asked, growing slightly panicked when he noticed that the man was slumped in his seat.

"Backseat," the man gasped. Gabriel wasted no time in climbing into the backseat and rummaging around in the first aid kit he found sitting on the floor.

"There's no EpiPen in here," he said, voice tinged with alarm.

"Of course there isn't," said the man, but Gabriel frowned when he didn't hear the wheezing, gasping sentences of a man who was slowly suffocating. The hairs on the back of his neck rose and a little voice in his head - one that sounded suspiciously like Castiel - told him that something was wrong, that he needed to get out immediately.

He turned, fully intent on getting out of the car before he even assessed the situation, but he didn't even make it to his feet. Something huge and heavy slammed into the side of his head, causing stars to dance in front of his vision and sharp pain to blossom in his skull.

He didn't have a chance to even call for Sam before his world went black and he knew no more.

* * *

When he woke up, it was because the pounding in his head was becoming too much for him to bear. Something wet and sticky was matting his hair on the left side of his head and his jaw and neck were stiff. He opened his eyes and groaned, immediately closing them again against the onslaught of painful light and blurry shapes.

Slowly, he cracked open his eyes and let them adjust, noticing as he did so that he was sitting upright. His eyes fully adjusted and he looked around (slowly, because his head still hurt like a bitch. God, he hoped he didn't have a concussion) and took stock of himself the situation.

He was sitting in a chair in the middle of a large room. The floors were marble tiles and the walls were a depressing dark grey. There were no windows and the only door was most likely locked. He couldn't feel his hands or his feet; they were tied tightly to the chair he was on and the circulation had been cut off enough that they'd fallen asleep.

He could barely remember what had happened to land him in this situation. He'd been in the park with Sam, he'd gone to the cafe to use the bathroom, and then… and then what? He knew he was forgetting something important, but he (obviously) couldn't remember what that important thing was.

He turned his head to try and see behind him, but faced forward again when his head throbbed and his stomach rolled dangerously. He didn't try that again, not really wanting to know what his breakfast would look like spread all over his lap. His head stopped throbbing after a few moments and settled down into a dull ache, but his stomach didn't settle. His stomachache was back, and it didn't seem like it was going to go away, so he tried to ignore it and focused on contacting his mate.

 _Sam?_ he said in his mind, and immediately he was swamped with Sam. The Bond flooded with worry and fear and anger and relief, and Gabriel could feel phantom fingers running lovingly down his face.

 _Gabriel!_ Sam said, his voice breathless with relief and frantic with panic. _I'm so glad you're okay. What happened? Are you hurt? Where are you?_

 _Slow down, Samshine,_ Gabriel said. _I don't know where I am. A basement maybe? It's cold enough to be underground._

Are you hurt?

Sam repeated.

 _Nothing's fatal. Probably have a concussion, though._

Sam growled at that, and his anger grew.

 _The pack is searching for you. We're attempting to find a scent trail or something._

 _Well, you're not going to find anything unless you can distinguish between cars by scent alone. I'm pretty sure I was taken somewhere too far to walk to, Sam._

Sam cursed violently, and Gabriel would have smiled if he wasn't in pain and tied to a chair in a basement.

 _What did the car look like?_

 _Black Toyota,_ Gabriel answered. _Looked pretty new. It was a Sienna, I think? I didn't get the license plate, sorry._

 _No, that's good. Who took you?_

 _Some dude. He never told me his name, but he was taller than me, and older. Short black hair, dark brown eyes…_

 _Ethnicity?_ Sam asked.

 _Black. And there was something… off about him._

 _Off how?_

 _Off like… I don't know. But he put me on edge. I could just tell that there was something dangerous about him._

 _And yet you still got into a car with him?_ Sam asked incredulously.

Gabriel scowled. _I thought he was dying,_ he said in his own defense. There came a noise from outside the room, a sharp clicking sound that Gabriel realized were footsteps. Someone was coming. _Christ, he's coming back!_

 _Okay, Gabriel, relax,_ Sam commanded. _Calm down. Let me see through your eyes._

Gabriel opened the Bond up even more, allowing Sam to tap into his senses, see what he saw, hear what he heard. The door clicked and then the handle turned, and two men stepped into the room. One was the man who'd actually kidnapped Gabriel, but the other was unfamiliar.

He was tall, it looked like. He had black hair that was combed to one side, and piercing blue eyes that narrowed as they settled on Gabriel. He came towards the bound teen, his strides purposeful. Gabriel leaned back as he drew closer, but he was tied to a chair, for fuck's sake, so there wasn't really anywhere for him to go.

The man knelt down and pushed his face right next to Gabriel's. Gabriel hunched his shoulders defensively but all the man did was sniff him, breathing in deeply. Sam growled in his mind, and Gabriel could feel the rage pouring in through the Bond. The man stood up again.

"Is he the one?" asked the one who'd taken Gabriel from the park.

"He is. You did well, Raphael," said the first man. Raphael nodded, but it looked stiff and almost forced. "Go tell the rest of the pack that our search is over. We'll stay here until we get what we came for, and then we're going."

"Yes, Alpha," Raphael said, and Gabriel's eyes widened.

Werewolves.

 _Shit!_ Sam said loudly in his mind. _Gabriel, hang on. I have to focus right now, but we think we found a trail._

 _Hurry,_ Gabriel begged, and then he was alone in his mind. Not completely, of course, but Sam's presence was faint.

The wolf in front of him stalked forward, and Gabriel had to refrain from rolling his eyes. Of all the things he could've gotten kidnapped by, it just had to be freaking werewolves. He wasn't excited to be part of some Alpha's pissing contest, and as far as he could tell, that was exactly what this was shaping up to be.

"So," said the Alpha. "You are the Shurley boy." It wasn't a question, but Gabriel answered it anyway.

"And you are a walking bag of fleas," Gabriel said in the same tone the Alpha had used. He smirked when the wolf growled.

"How dare you? Do you know who I am?" he demanded.

"Well, I don't know your name and I've never seen you before, so that would have to be a no." Christ almighty, Gabriel was going to die. There would be a news broadcast about it, maybe, and he could just see what the headline would be now. _Idiotic teenager wouldn't shut up after getting kidnapped by werewolf, ended up getting stabbed with claws and teeth._

The wolf leaned forward until he was mere inches from Gabriel's face.

"You're walking a thin line, pup," he growled.

"I'm not a pup," Gabriel shot back.

"Please. You probably haven't even seen twenty years yet." The man finally exited Gabriel's bubble and took a few steps back. "But enough about that. I want information, and I'm willing to do whatever it takes to get that information," he promised. "I have no problem hurting a pup to accomplish my goal."

"Which is?"

"Revenge." Of fucking course. "For what your father did to me."

"And what did he do, exactly?" Gabriel asked, one eyebrow raised. The Alpha's demeanor changed suddenly, and there was something dangerous in the air. No longer was he reacting coolly to Gabriel's snarkiness. No, now his eyes were glowing blue and his teeth were bared in a snarl, a sure sign that the wolf was coming out to play and he was treading in dangerous waters.

"He took my brother from me!" the Alpha snarled. "Hunted my pack like we were no better than Hokkaido and murdered my brother in cold blood."

Uh oh.

"He didn't know the difference between Hokkaido and Grey Wolves," Gabriel insisted. "But now he does. And trust me, he never meant to hurt anyone that didn't deserve it."

The Alpha snarled again, and his canines dropped down until they were protruding out of his mouth.

"That's not going to bring my brother back!" he shouted, and Gabriel flinched back when he suddenly came up to him. "Now," he continued, voice quiet and cold with fury. "You will tell me where the hunter is or you will end up like the others."

"Others?" Gabriel repeated, confusion evident in his voice. But then his eyes widened with realization. "You're the one that was torturing and killing hunters!"

"A means to an end," the Alpha said dismissively. "Now talk. Where is Chuck Shurley?"

Gabriel pressed his lips together and looked away, refusing to answer. The Alpha's eyes blazed and he growled loudly.

"Tell me!" he demanded, and something in his tone compelled Gabriel to obey. _He's using his dominance over me,_ Gabriel realized. Something in him twitched and pushed, trying to answer, to obey the command, but another larger part - his human part - fought against it and resisted the command.

Claws sprouted out of the Alpha's fingers, and he poised one at Gabriel's throat.

"Last chance," he warned. Gabriel's heart sped up and his eyes widened with fear, but he still refused to talk. "Fine. We'll do this the hard way."

"Michael!"

The door exploded open and Raphael burst in, eyes wide and chest heaving.

"What?" Michael growled, turning to face him with fury-filled eyes. Raphael dropped his eyes almost immediately and spoke to the floor.

"The pup's pack is here," he said. "We can't keep them out for much longer."

Michael turned back to Gabriel. He sneered at the hope in the latter's eyes.

"Don't get your hopes up," he said scathingly. "My pack is more than able to handle a few wolves."

Gabriel stared defiantly into Michael's eyes, knowing from what Sam had told him that doing so was a direct challenge to any dominant wolf. Michael growled when Gabriel refused to look away, and eventually he was forced to tear his gaze from Gabriel's so that he could leave to deal with the situation. Gabriel smirked at Michael's back as the Alpha and Raphael left.

As soon as the door closed and locked, Gabriel's smile dropped and he reached out to Sam through their Bond.

 _Sam, what's going on?_

It was a while before Sam responded, long enough that Gabriel started to get worried at the prolonged silence. After a tense few minutes, Sam answered.

 _We found the pack that took you,_ Sam said. _They left their car in the driveway, the idiots._

 _Are you outside the house? Where'd they take me?_

 _Far. We're nowhere near any other people. Good for us, I guess; we're in our wolf forms and we're not risking anyone seeing us._

Sam opened up the Bond and Gabriel suddenly found himself in his mate's mind, seeing what Sam was seeing. It was a little disconcerting, being so close to the ground all of a sudden, but he pushed aside his discomfort and focused more on what was going on.

Wolves streaked in and out of his vision, too many for him to count, but he could tell that most, if not all, of the pack had come. They were all stalking around a large two-story house; every so often, one of them would charge at the front door or one of the windows, snarling and slashing and biting, trying to get in.

Nothing was working, and Sam snarled in frustration when a large black wolf failed to knock down the door.

Suddenly, all the wolves stilled. Sam turned to look behind him and stepped back when John stalked forward. He was the only one not in his wolf form, but still he seemed more dangerous than any of the snarling wolves surrounding the house.

John strode up to the front door, his eyes glowing brown and his lips pulled back in a snarl. He pounded three times on the wood with his fist.

"Open. The. Door," he growled, and all the wolves whined as his power spread through the yard. The wolves on the other side of the door felt it too, apparently, and were less dominant than John was, because they could only resist for a few seconds before the door was flung open.

Immediately wolves leapt out of the house, and John jumped backwards and phased at the same time in order to meet them head on. A fight broke out in the yard, and the air was filled with the sounds of snarling and snapping jaws. No one paid Sam any attention as he slipped through the yard-turned-battlefield and slipped through the front door and into the house.

Well, almost no one. One wolf, his short fur a dirty blond colour and his eyes a startling green, followed Sam. Dean nipped Sam on the shoulder when he caught up, silently saying that he had his brother's back. The two wolves stalked silently through the house, sniffing at every door for traces of Gabriel.

 _We're on our way, Gabriel, hold on,_ Sam said. Gabriel's reply was cut off when something huge and snarling slammed into Sam all of a sudden, knocking Gabriel out of his mind. Gabriel found his mind slammed back into his own body, and he sat, stunned, for a few moments. He squeezed his eyes shut to stop the room from spinning and took a deep breath to keep the nausea at bay. His stomach cramped uncomfortably, letting him know that it was unhappy with his current choice of pastimes.

 _Sam?_ Gabriel called when he was sure he wasn't going to puke. No reply. Fear wrapped its fingers around his heart and squeezed, and Gabriel's eyes widened. _Sam?!_

The door to the basement exploded inward in a shower of wood and tiny bits of metal, and Gabriel turned his head and tried to protect his face as much as he could while bound to a chair. Three wolves tumbled into the room, the bigger two locked in a deadly embrace. The biggest of them all he recognized as Sam, and he assumed, based on the colouring, that the dark grey one was Michael.

Gabriel was so absorbed in watching with bated breath as his mate slashed and snapped and dodged that he didn't notice when the third wolf snuck up to him. It bit and tore at the ropes binding his arms and legs to the chair until they fell away in tatters. Gabriel tried to stand and almost immediately fell, and had Dean not phased back and caught him, he would have ended up on the floor.

Neither of them cared that Dean was naked, both of them focusing instead on Sam's fight. Sam was good, but it appeared that Michael was better. For every gash Sam opened up on Michael, Michael made two more on Sam. Blood dripped onto the floor and the wolves' snarls and yelps echoed loudly in the room, and Gabriel felt like he was actually going to be sick.

The fight raged on for what felt like forever. Gabriel flinched violently every time Sam yelped in pain, tensed every time his mate was just a bit too slow to dodge a swipe from Michael's paws. If not for Dean's iron-like grip on his arms, Gabriel definitely would have jumped into the middle of the fight in order to try and help Sam.

And speaking of Sam, the wolf had closed his mind off from Gabriel's. He was focused entirely on the fight, and Gabriel didn't know whether or not he should've been glad about that.

After about two minutes, it appeared that Sam was gaining the upper hand. He was backing Michael into a corner, using his larger bulk to prevent the Alpha from escaping. When Michael's flanks hit the wall, Sam stopped and crouched, preparing to make his final lunge.

He snarled, tensed, leapt, and it looked like his aim was true. Gabriel's breath caught and he couldn't take his eyes off of his mate, not even when Michael, in a burst of speed and agility that Gabriel hadn't expected from him, slid underneath Sam and clamped his jaws down on his throat.

Gabriel's heart stopped.

Michael pulled viciously and Sam yelped as he was slammed against the floor. He struggled, but Michael didn't relent, no matter how many times Sam's claws swept over his muzzle. The blood was pooling on the floor and Sam's struggles were weakening, and still Michael didn't let go.

Sam finally stopped moving, his head flopping to the side and his paws hitting the ground with a dull thump, and Gabriel was shocked out of his trance.

"No!" he shouted, his anguished voice sounding way too loud in the room, which all of a sudden was too small, too confining.

But Sam's chest was still moving, albeit barely, which meant that he was still alive. Michael must have seen it, too, because he crouched and tensed, obviously preparing to finish what he'd started. So many thoughts ran through Gabriel's mind in that one instant, and at the center of it all was Sam.

His mate was in danger, was about to be killed right in front of him, and there was nothing he could do about it. Gabriel's fear gave way to anger, and red clouded his vision as he zeroed in on the one who had dared touch what was his. His eyes narrowed, his hands clenched into fists, his lips pulled back as he growled.

Michael pounced, going for the kill.

Gabriel did the same.


	14. Chapter 14

Dean was barely holding himself together. Only his grip on Gabriel's arms kept him from phasing and knocking the Alpha off of his brother, who was slowly being strangled right in front of him. He wanted to interfere, to help his brother, but he knew that Sam - and especially Sam's wolf - wouldn't take well to that, not when he viewed killing the Alpha as his right since it had been his mate that had been taken.

His eyes didn't waver as he watched; his heart had stopped beating a few moments ago, he was sure, and he was surprised that Gabriel hadn't shrugged off his probably painful grip yet. Then again, Gabriel probably didn't even notice because he was most likely just as invested in this fight as Dean was. More so, even, because it was his mate whose movements were slowing.

It was when Sam stopped moving completely that Dean knew he had to do something. His hope that Sam would somehow pull a miracle out of his ass hadn't come to fruition, and it was high time somebody did something.

Gabriel, apparently, agreed, because just before Dean stepped forward, he growled. And not the pitiful grating growls that humans usually made when upset; no, this was a full-on growl, the kind that Dean would have expected of a full-blooded Grey. He looked down at Gabriel in shock, but his gaze flicked back up when the Alpha pounced at Sam. He let go of Gabriel and prepared himself to phase, but - again - he was stopped by Gabriel.

Or more specifically, by _Gabriel phasing._

His mouth dropped open and his eyes nearly popped out of their sockets when a small, golden brown wolf exploded out of Gabriel's clothes and charged at the Alpha, fangs bared in a deadly snarl and paws outstretched so that he landed claws first on the bigger wolf's back. The Alpha growled and twisted around to bite at Gabriel, but the latter let himself fall to the floor and sunk into a crouch between the unconscious Sam and the wolf intent on killing him.

The Alpha circled around Gabriel, who was forced to do the same to keep Sam behind him. Every so often, one of them would dart forward to bite at the other and then retreat to a safe distance. The tension in the air was nearly palpable, and Dean shifted into his wolf form almost instinctively, just incase he needed to jump in and help.

The Alpha charged forward once more and Dean tensed, ready to jump and meet him halfway, but he stopped when Gabriel snarled and darted forward. They met in the middle of the room and soon were nothing more than a ball of writhing, snarling fangs and claws. Blood splattered the floor and Dean couldn't tell if it was Gabriel's or the Alpha's.

He stalked around the two wolves, growling softly, ears pricked and gaze unwavering. He wanted to jump in, to help, but he couldn't find an opening that would enable him to harm the Alpha and not Gabriel. So he waited, and he watched, and he kept himself tense, ready to spring the moment he got an opening.

He waited, and waited, and waited… there!

The fight broke apart just long enough for Dean to dart forward and bowl the unsuspecting Alpha onto his side. He pinned the wolf down with his entire body weight, trying to avoid the flailing paws. He yipped at Gabriel, who was shaking his head, trying to clear it from the blow that had broken the fight up in the first place. At the sound of Dean's voice, he started, and then he ran over.

While Dean held the Alpha in place, Gabriel reached down and fastened his teeth around his neck. With one gargantuan yank, the Alpha's throat was torn from his body. Blood sprayed everywhere, landing hot and sticky on the floor, the walls, and Dean and Gabriel's fur. The Alpha twitched once, twice, three times, and then lay still.

He didn't move again.

Dean could hear the fighting upstairs come to an immediate standstill as the Alpha's pack felt his death. Gabriel threw his head back and howled in victory. All the wolves within earshot copied him, John's pack victoriously, and the Alpha's pack in grief.

When the howling died down, Dean turned to Gabriel, intent on nipping at his shoulder or licking his ear to say _Good job._ But Gabriel was swaying where he stood, and before Dean could get there, he collapsed right on top of the dead Alpha.

 _Well, shit._

* * *

 **Hey, Lovelies! This marks the end of the first installment of The Adventures of the Super Gay grey Wolves series! I just want to thank everyone who followed, favorited, commented, or even just read this. It means a lot to me when people appreciate things that I create :) Also, I just wanted to say that a sequel will be coming. I don't know when, but it will be. Until then, I'm going to be posting a lot of other stuff, so keep an eye out. I have a Supernatural Aladdin AU in the works right now that I'm going to upload soon, so make sure to check that out. And, as always, thanks a ton, guys!**


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